Requirements - Why What and How?

Sriram Mohan

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Outline

• Why ?• What ?• How ?

Why Requirements

Some facts

• 250 billion dollar industry• 31% projects cancelled(money lost 81 billion

dollars)• 52.7% cost 189% of their original estimates

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Biggest Reasons forProject Success and Failure

Project Failure

• Lack of user input (13%)• Incomplete requirements (12%)• Changing requirements (12%)

Project Success

• User involvement (16%)• Executive management support (14%)• Clear statement of requirements (12%)

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Defects by Development Phase

• Requirements – 31% • Design – 25%• Coding – 12%• Documentation – 16%• Bad fixes – 16%

Cost to Fix Errors

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RequirementsDesignCodingUnit TestAcceptance TestMaintenance

1 5 25 50125500

Why ?

• Requirements errors are likely to be the most common class of error

• Requirements errors are likely to be the most expensive to fix

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What is a Software Requirement?

What is a Software Requirement?

1. A software capability needed by the user to solve a problem to achieve an objective

2. A software capability that must be met or possessed by a system or system component to satisfy a contract, standard, specification or other formally imposed documentation

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What is Software Requirements MGMT?

What is Software Requirements Management?

• The process of systematically, eliciting, organizing and documenting requirements for the software system, and a process that establishes and maintains agreement between the customer and the project team on the changing

requirements of the system.

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What does it involve?

• Understand the need - the problem to be solved

• Propose features - how the need will be resolved

• Requirements are the specific conditions that are imposed on the solution

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Needs

Features

Requirements

Problem

Domain

SolutionDomain

Software Lifecycle Process Models

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Waterfall Model

• Manufacturing life cycle model• Assumes

– multi-stage development cycle– completely separate stages– output of one stage is input for next– each stage complete before next is begun

Waterfall Stages

Requirements

Design

Coding

Testing

Maintenance

Advantages

• Much better than chaos!• Clearly defined stages help with

– planning, scheduling– management, organization– accountability, control

Disadvantages

• Not very practical (do not know requirements in the beginning)

• Customer sees nothing until last step

• Change is Anathema

Spiral Model

• Incremental– more feedback from customer

• Risk analysis– more rigorous analysis of risk at each

stage

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Spiral Model

Iterative (or Incremental) Approach

• Four phases– Inception– Elaboration– Construction– Transition

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Iterative(or Incremental) Approach

• An iteration is a sequence of activities with an established plan and evaluation criteria, resulting in an executable of some type

• Each phase goes under a # of iterations

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Management

Environment

Business Modeling

Implementation

Test

Analysis & Design

Preliminary Iteration(s)

Iter.#1

Phases

Iterations

Iter.#2

Iter.#n

Iter.#n+1

Iter.#n+2

Iter.#m

Iter.#m+1

Deployment

Configuration Mgmt

Requirements

Elaboration TransitionInception Construction

Workflows group activities logically

In an iteration, you walk through all activities

Process Workflow

Support Workflow

Rational Unified Process Model

Team Project Process

• Modified Waterfall model will be used in 371• You may choose any model you desire during

implementation in 372

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Software Development

• Is this a team activity? Why?

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Requirements Team Skills

1. Analyzing the Problem2. Understanding User and Stakeholder Needs3. Defining the System4. Managing Scope5. Refining the System Definition6. Building the Right System