COMP 215 SYSTEM ANALYSIS AND DESIGN

Lecture on Requirements Engineering Process

Prof. Cheruiyot W.K, PhD

Computing and Informatics Department


Processes used to discover,
analyse and validate system
requirements
Objectives

To describe the principal requirements
engineering activities

To introduce techniques for requirements
elicitation and analysis

To describe requirements validation

To discuss the role of requirements management
in support of other requirements engineering
processes
Topics covered

Feasibility studies

Requirements elicitation and analysis

Requirements validation

Requirements management
Requirements engineering processes

The processes used for RE vary widely
depending on the application domain, the people
involved and the organisation developing the
requirements

However, there are a number of generic
activities common to all processes
• Requirements elicitation
• Requirements analysis
• Requirements validation
• Requirements management
The requirements engineering process
Feasibility studies

A feasibility study decides whether or not the
proposed system is worthwhile

A short focused study that checks
• If the system contributes to organisational objectives
• If the system can be engineered using current technology and
within budget
• If the system can be integrated with other systems that are
used
Feasibility study implementation

Based on information assessment (what is
required), information collection and report
writing

Questions for people in the organisation
• What if the system wasn’t implemented?
• What are current process problems?
• How will the proposed system help?
• What will be the integration problems?
• Is new technology needed? What skills?
• What facilities must be supported by the proposed system?
Elicitation and analysis

Sometimes called requirements elicitation or
requirements discovery

Involves technical staff working with customers
to find out about the application domain, the
services that the system should provide and the
system’s operational constraints

May involve end-users, managers, engineers
involved in maintenance, domain experts, trade
unions, etc. These are called stakeholders
Problems of requirements
analysis

Stakeholders don’t know what they really want

Stakeholders express requirements in their own terms

Different stakeholders may have conflicting
requirements

Organisational and political factors may influence the
system requirements

The requirements change during the analysis process.
New stakeholders may emerge and the business
environment change
The requirements analysis
process
Process activities

Domain understanding

Requirements collection

Classification

Conflict resolution

Prioritisation

Requirements checking
System models

Different models may be produced during the
requirements analysis activity

Requirements analysis may involve three
structuring activities which result in these
different models
• Partitioning. Identifies the structural (part-of) relationships
between entities
• Abstraction. Identifies generalities among entities
• Projection. Identifies different ways of looking at a problem
Viewpoint-oriented elicitation

Stakeholders represent different ways of looking
at a problem or problem viewpoints

This multi-perspective analysis is important as
there is no single correct way to analyse system
requirements
Banking ATM system

The example used here is an auto-teller system
which provides some automated banking services

I use a very simplified system which offers some
services to customers of the bank who own the
system and a narrower range of services to other
customers

Services include cash withdrawal, message
passing (send a message to request a service),
ordering a statement and transferring funds
Autoteller viewpoints

Bank customers

Representatives of other banks

Hardware and software maintenance engineers

Marketing department

Bank managers and counter staff

Database administrators and security staff

Communications engineers

Personnel department
Types of viewpoint

Data sources or sinks
• Viewpoints are responsible for producing or consuming data.
Analysis involves checking that data is produced and consumed
and that assumptions about the source and sink of data are valid

Representation frameworks
• Viewpoints represent particular types of system model. These may
be compared to discover requirements that would be missed using
a single representation. Particularly suitable for real-time systems

Receivers of services
• Viewpoints are external to the system and receive services from it.
Most suited to interactive systems
External viewpoints

Natural to think of end-users as receivers of
system services

Viewpoints are a natural way to structure
requirements elicitation

It is relatively easy to decide if a viewpoint is
valid

Viewpoints and services may be sued to
structure non-functional requirements
Method-based analysis

Widely used approach to requirements analysis.
Depends on the application of a structured
method to understand the system

Methods have different emphases. Some are
designed for requirements elicitation, others are
close to design methods

A viewpoint-oriented method (VORD) is used as
an example here. It also illustrates the use of
viewpoints
The VORD method
It is used in detecting and collecting the stakeholders'
requirements that are important for developing the
information system or software system.
The viewpoint-oriented requirement definition (VORD)
method is applied in the requirements analysis process.
VORD process model

Viewpoint identification
• Discover viewpoints which receive system services and identify
the services provided to each viewpoint

Viewpoint structuring
• Group related viewpoints into a hierarchy. Common services
are provided at higher-levels in the hierarchy

Viewpoint documentation
• Refine the description of the identified viewpoints and services

Viewpoint-system mapping
• Transform the analysis to an object-oriented design
VORD standard forms
Viewpoint identification
Viewpoint service information
Viewpoint data/control
Viewpoint hierarchy
Customer/cash withdrawal
templates
Scenarios

Scenarios are descriptions of how a system is
used in practice

They are helpful in requirements elicitation as
people can relate to these more readily than
abstract statement of what they require from a
system

Scenarios are particularly useful for adding detail
to an outline requirements description
Scenario descriptions

System state at the beginning of the scenario

Normal flow of events in the scenario

What can go wrong and how this is handled

Other concurrent activities

System state on completion of the scenario
Event scenarios

Event scenarios may be used to describe how a
system responds to the occurrence of some
particular event such as ‘start transaction’

VORD includes a diagrammatic convention for
event scenarios.
• Data provided and delivered
• Control information
• Exception processing
• The next expected event
Event scenario - start transaction
Notation for data and control
analysis

Ellipses. data provided from or delivered to a
viewpoint

Control information enters and leaves at the top
of each box

Data leaves from the right of each box

Exceptions are shown at the bottom of each box

Name of next event is in box with thick edges
Exception description

Most methods do not include facilities for
describing exceptions

In this example, exceptions are
• Timeout. Customer fails to enter a PIN within the allowed time
limit
• Invalid card. The card is not recognised and is returned
• Stolen card. The card has been registered as stolen and is
retained by the machine
Use cases

Use-cases are a scenario based technique in the
UML which identify the actors in an interaction
and which describe the interaction itself

A set of use cases should describe all possible
interactions with the system

Sequence diagrams may be used to add detail
to use-cases by showing the sequence of event
processing in the system
Lending use-case
Library use-cases
Catalogue management
Social and organisational factors

Software systems are used in a social and
organisational context. This can influence or
even dominate the system requirements

Social and organisational factors are not a single
viewpoint but are influences on all viewpoints

Good analysts must be sensitive to these factors
but currently no systematic way to tackle their
analysis
Example

Consider a system which allows senior
management to access information without
going through middle managers
• Managerial status. Senior managers may feel that they are too
important to use a keyboard. This may limit the type of system
interface used
• Managerial responsibilities. Managers may have no
uninterrupted time where they can learn to use the system
• Organisational resistance. Middle managers who will be made
redundant may deliberately provide misleading or incomplete
information so that the system will fail
Ethnography

A social scientists spends a considerable time
observing and analysing how people actually work

People do not have to explain or articulate their
work

Social and organisational factors of importance
may be observed

Ethnographic studies have shown that work is
usually richer and more complex than suggested
by simple system models
Focused ethnography

Developed in a project studying the air traffic
control process

Combines ethnography with prototyping

Prototype development results in unanswered
questions which focus the ethnographic analysis

Problem with ethnography is that it studies
existing practices which may have some
historical basis which is no longer relevant
Ethnography and prototyping
Scope of ethnography

Requirements that are derived from the way that
people actually work rather than the way I which
process definitions suggest that they ought to
work

Requirements that are derived from cooperation
and awareness of other people’s activities
Requirements validation

Concerned with demonstrating that the
requirements define the system that the
customer really wants

Requirements error costs are high so validation
is very important
• Fixing a requirements error after delivery may cost up to 100
times the cost of fixing an implementation error
Requirements checking

Validity. Does the system provide the functions
which best support the customer’s needs?

Consistency. Are there any requirements
conflicts?

Completeness. Are all functions required by the
customer included?

Realism. Can the requirements be implemented
given available budget and technology

Verifiability. Can the requirements be checked?
Requirements validation
techniques

Requirements reviews
• Systematic manual analysis of the requirements

Prototyping
• Using an executable model of the system to check
requirements.

Test-case generation
• Developing tests for requirements to check testability

Automated consistency analysis
• Checking the consistency of a structured requirements
description
Requirements reviews

Regular reviews should be held while the
requirements definition is being formulated

Both client and contractor staff should be
involved in reviews

Reviews may be formal (with completed
documents) or informal. Good communications
between developers, customers and users can
resolve problems at an early stage
Review checks

Verifiability. Is the requirement realistically
testable?

Comprehensibility. Is the requirement properly
understood?

Traceability. Is the origin of the requirement
clearly stated?

Adaptability. Can the requirement be changed
without a large impact on other requirements?
Automated consistency checking
Requirements management

Requirements management is the process of
managing changing requirements during the
requirements engineering process and system
development

Requirements are inevitably incomplete and
inconsistent
• New requirements emerge during the process as business needs
change and a better understanding of the system is developed
• Different viewpoints have different requirements and these are
often contradictory
Requirements change

The priority of requirements from different
viewpoints changes during the development
process

System customers may specify requirements
from a business perspective that conflict with
end-user requirements

The business and technical environment of the
system changes during its development
Requirements evolution
Enduring and volatile
requirements

Enduring requirements. Stable requirements
derived from the core activity of the customer
organisation. E.g. a hospital will always have
doctors, nurses, etc. May be derived from
domain models

Volatile requirements. Requirements which
change during development or when the system
is in use. In a hospital, requirements derived
from health-care policy
Classification of requirements

Mutable requirements
• Requirements that change due to the system’s environment

Emergent requirements
• Requirements that emerge as understanding of the system
develops

Consequential requirements
• Requirements that result from the introduction of the computer
system

Compatibility requirements
• Requirements that depend on other systems or organisational
processes
Requirements management planning

During the requirements engineering process,
you have to plan:
• Requirements identification
» How requirements are individually identified
• A change management process
» The process followed when analysing a requirements change
• Traceability policies
» The amount of information about requirements relationships that is
maintained
• CASE tool support
» The tool support required to help manage requirements change
Traceability

Traceability is concerned with the relationships
between requirements, their sources and the
system design

Source traceability
• Links from requirements to stakeholders who proposed these
requirements

Requirements traceability
• Links between dependent requirements

Design traceability
• Links from the requirements to the design
A traceability matrix
CASE tool support

Requirements storage
• Requirements should be managed in a secure, managed data
store

Change management
• The process of change management is a workflow process
whose stages can be defined and information flow between
these stages partially automated

Traceability management
• Automated retrieval of the links between requirements
Requirements change management

Should apply to all proposed changes to the
requirements

Principal stages
• Problem analysis. Discuss requirements problem and propose
change
• Change analysis and costing. Assess effects of change on
other requirements
• Change implementation. Modify requirements document and
other documents to reflect change
Requirements change management
Key points

The requirements engineering process includes a
feasibility study, requirements elicitation and
analysis, requirements specification and
requirements management

Requirements analysis is iterative involving domain
understanding, requirements collection,
classification, structuring, prioritisation and
validation

Systems have multiple stakeholders with different
requirements
Key points

Social and organisation factors influence system
requirements

Requirements validation is concerned with
checks for validity, consistency, completeness,
realism and verifiability

Business changes inevitably lead to changing
requirements

Requirements management includes planning
and change management