Practical Requirements Engineering
Christof Ebert, Vector Consulting Services
Total pages: 45
$29.00
Introduction
Requirements engineering (RE) is about identifying and evolving needs or problems to specifications for systems and solutions that target those initial needs. As we move from a perceived need to a structured specification and, finally, to a solution, we can identify several risks that characterize RE as a discipline — namely, overlooking a crucial requirement, inadequately representing or understanding the customer, considering only functional requirements, not verifying requirements, attempting to perfect requirements before beginning construction, representing requirements in the form of designs, and jumping too fast to a solution before understanding the problem domain. These risks are most effectively addressed during collection, analysis, and specification by categorizing requirements (that is, grouping requirements, permitting a higher-level understanding of relationships and dependencies, and consistently applying a specification template); organizing requirements (using automated tools to assist in understanding and tracing requirements from inception to allocation to delivery and applying strict change management); and prioritizing requirements (determining the order of consideration based on criticality of need and level of associated risk, implementing in increments following the priorities, and de-scoping those requirements with the lowest priority).
RE integrates these techniques by providing processes, methods, and tools throughout the product's life cycle, from the problem analysis stage to the system implementation and maintenance stages. Although RE varies greatly depending on the domain involved, similarities in its structure follow certain steps: elicitation, analysis, specification, verification, and management.
The articles in this bundle provide concrete usage scenarios of RE concepts in industry, with how-to tips, case studies, and examples of how you can best use RE. In "Requirements Engineering: The State of the Practice," for example, Colin Neill and Phillip Laplante summarize the deployment and use of current RE practices in industry. They show what is working and what doesn't deliver to expectations. "Requirements Engineering in Automotive Development: Experiences and Challenges," from Matthias Weber and Joachim Weisbrod is a practical industry paper describing the overall RE process, challenges, and experiences as it's used by a major car manufacturer. "ERP Requirements Engineering Practice: Lessons Learned," by Maya. Daneva provides a practical case study on how RE is practiced in IT systems development with COTS solutions that are adapted for practical usage. This paper also offers insight in RE for IT systems. Laura Lehtola with her coauthors emphasize that RE is closely linked to the business success of products. Their article shows how RE is more effectively lined up with business decision making. Finally, "Understanding the Product Life Cycle: Four Key Requirements Engineering Techniques" is a classic article that shows how RE is embedded and integrated into the product life cycle. It provides useful industry examples of how to improve RE processes end-to-end.
These articles on RE provide a look at practical experiences in applying RE to projects and product development with a focus on how to make it happen in your own environment. I selected them based on their practical insights and added value from real-world industrial applications of RE processes, methods, and tools.
Keywords: requirements engineering, product life cycle, product development, state of the practice,
Table of Contents
Requirements Engineering: The State of the Practice
Colin J. Neill and Phillip A. Laplante, Penn State University
This exploratory survey and its quantitative results offer opportunities for further interpreting and comparing practices in requirements elicitation, requirements specification document development, and specification validation.
Requirements Engineering in Automotive Development: Experiences and Challenges
Matthias Weber and Joachim Weisbrod, DaimlerChrysler Research
Complex automotive systems yield complex requirements specifications and raise many challenges along the way. Using real-world projects as a foundation, the authors describe problems and solutions for requirements engineering in the automotive domain.
ERP Requirements Engineering Practice: Lessons Learned
Maya Daneva, Telus Mobility
Little information exists about the challenges involved in implementing enterprise resource planning systems. Among the keys to success are planning RE model use in the client's context and installing processes to support key RE activities.
Linking the Business View to Requirements Engineering: Long-Term Product Planning by Roadmapping
Laura Lehtola, Marjo Kauppinen and Sari Kujala, Helsinki University of Technology
Roadmapping is one technique that companies have used for long-term product planning in order to link the business view to requirements engineering (RE), and to make more business oriented product development decisions. This paper gives an overview.
Understanding the Product Life Cycle: Four Key Requirements Engineering Techniques
Christof Ebert, Alcatel
A field study involving many industry projects revealed that only those that took a requirements engineering perspective in four key product lifecycle management
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