Software Requiement
Software Requiement
system. Requirements convey the expectations of users from the software product. The
requirements can be obvious or hidden, known or unknown, expected or unexpected
from client’s point of view.
Requirement Engineering
The process to gather the software requirements from client, analyze and document
them is known as requirement engineering.
The goal of requirement engineering is to develop and maintain sophisticated and
descriptive ‘System Requirements Specification’ document.
Feasibility Study
Requirement Gathering
Software Requirement Specification
Software Requirement Validation
Let us see the process briefly -
Feasibility study
When the client approaches the organization for getting the desired product developed,
it comes up with rough idea about what all functions the software must perform and which
all features are expected from the software.
Referencing to this information, the analysts does a detailed study about whether the
desired system and its functionality are feasible to develop.
This feasibility study is focused towards goal of the organization. This study analyzes
whether the software product can be practically materialized in terms of implementation,
contribution of project to organization, cost constraints and as per values and objectives
of the organization. It explores technical aspects of the project and product such as
usability, maintainability, productivity and integration ability.
The output of this phase should be a feasibility study report that should contain adequate
comments and recommendations for management about whether or not the project
should be undertaken.
Requirement Gathering
If the feasibility report is positive towards undertaking the project, next phase starts with
gathering requirements from the user. Analysts and engineers communicate with the
client and end-users to know their ideas on what the software should provide and which
features they want the software to include.
Requirements gathering - The developers discuss with the client and end users and know
their expectations from the software.
Organizing Requirements - The developers prioritize and arrange the requirements in order
of importance, urgency and convenience.
Negotiation & discussion - If requirements are ambiguous or there are some conflicts in
requirements of various stakeholders, if they are, it is then negotiated and discussed with
stakeholders. Requirements may then be prioritized and reasonably compromised.
The requirements come from various stakeholders. To remove the ambiguity and conflicts,
they are discussed for clarity and correctness. Unrealistic requirements are compromised
reasonably.
Documentation - All formal & informal, functional and non-functional requirements are
documented and made available for next phase processing.
Interviews
Interviews are strong medium to collect requirements. Organization may conduct several
types of interviews such as:
Surveys
Organization may conduct surveys among various stakeholders by querying about their
expectation and requirements from the upcoming system.
Questionnaires
A document with pre-defined set of objective questions and respective options is handed
over to all stakeholders to answer, which are collected and compiled.
A shortcoming of this technique is, if an option for some issue is not mentioned in the
questionnaire, the issue might be left unattended.
Task analysis
Team of engineers and developers may analyze the operation for which the new system
is required. If the client already has some software to perform certain operation, it is
studied and requirements of proposed system are collected.
Domain Analysis
Every software falls into some domain category. The expert people in the domain can
be a great help to analyze general and specific requirements.
Brainstorming
An informal debate is held among various stakeholders and all their inputs are recorded
for further requirements analysis.
Prototyping
Prototyping is building user interface without adding detail functionality for user to
interpret the features of intended software product. It helps giving better idea of
requirements. If there is no software installed at client’s end for developer’s reference
and the client is not aware of its own requirements, the developer creates a prototype
based on initially mentioned requirements. The prototype is shown to the client and the
feedback is noted. The client feedback serves as an input for requirement gathering.
Observation
Team of experts visit the client’s organization or workplace. They observe the actual
working of the existing installed systems. They observe the workflow at client’s end and
how execution problems are dealt. The team itself draws some conclusions which aid to
form requirements expected from the software.
Clear
Correct
Consistent
Coherent
Comprehensible
Modifiable
Verifiable
Prioritized
Unambiguous
Traceable
Credible source
Software Requirements
We should try to understand what sort of requirements may arise in the requirement
elicitation phase and what kinds of requirements are expected from the software system.
Broadly software requirements should be categorized in two categories:
Functional Requirements
Requirements, which are related to functional aspect of software fall into this category.
They define functions and functionality within and from the software system.
Examples -
Non-Functional Requirements
Requirements, which are not related to functional aspect of software, fall into this
category. They are implicit or expected characteristics of software, which users make
assumption of.
Non-functional requirements include -
Security
Logging
Storage
Configuration
Performance
Cost
Interoperability
Flexibility
Disaster recovery
Accessibility
Requirements are categorized logically as
easy to operate
quick in response
effectively handling operational errors
providing simple yet consistent user interface
User acceptance majorly depends upon how user can use the software. UI is the only
way for users to perceive the system. A well performing software system must also be
equipped with attractive, clear, consistent and responsive user interface. Otherwise the
functionalities of software system can not be used in convenient way. A system is said
be good if it provides means to use it efficiently. User interface requirements are briefly
mentioned below -
Content presentation
Easy Navigation
Simple interface
Responsive
Consistent UI elements
Feedback mechanism
Default settings
Purposeful layout
Strategical use of color and texture.
Provide help information
User centric approach
Group based view settings.
Complexity Metrics - McCabe’s Cyclomatic complexity quantifies the upper bound of the
number of independent paths in a program, which is perceived as complexity of the program
or its modules. It is represented in terms of graph theory concepts by using control flow
graph.
Quality Metrics - Defects, their types and causes, consequence, intensity of severity and
their implications define the quality of product.
The number of defects found in development process and number of defects reported by the
client after the product is installed or delivered at client-end, define quality of product.
Process Metrics - In various phases of SDLC, the methods and tools used, the company
standards and the performance of development are software process metrics.
Resource Metrics - Effort, time and various resources used, represents metrics for resource
measurement.
In the software development process, requirement phase is the first software engineering
activity. This phase is a user-dominated phase and translates the ideas or views into a
requirements document. Note that defining and documenting the user requirements in a
concise and unambiguous manner is the first major step to achieve a high-quality product.
The requirement phase encompasses a set of tasks, which help to specify the impact of
the software on the organization, customers' needs, and how users will interact with the
developed software. The requirements are the basis of the system design. If requirements
are not correct the end product will also contain errors. Note that requirements activity
like all other software engineering activities should be adapted to the needs of the process,
the project, the product and the people involved in the activity. Also, the requirements
should be specified at different levels of detail. This is because requirements are meant
for people such as users, business managers, system engineers, and so on. For example,
business managers are interested in knowing which features can be implemented within
the allocated budget whereas end-users are interested in knowing how easy it is to use the
features of software.
Types of Requirements
Requirements help to understand the behavior of a system, which is described by various
tasks of the system. For example, some of the tasks of a system are to provide a response
to input values, determine the state of data objects, and so on. Note that requirements are
considered prior to the development of the software. The requirements, which are
commonly considered, are classified into three categories, namely, functional
requirements, non-functional requirements, and domain requirements.
IEEE defines functional requirements as 'a function that a system or component must be
able to perform.' These requirements describe the interaction of software with its
environment and specify the inputs, outputs, external interfaces, and the functions that
should be included in the software. Also, the services provided byfunctional requirements
specify the procedure by which the software should reactto particular inputs or behave in
particular situations.
To understand functional requirements properly, let us consider the following example of
an online banking system.
1. The user of the bank should be able to search the desired services from the available ones.
2. There should be appropriate documents' for users to read. This implies that when a user
wants to open an account in the bank, the forms must be available so that the user can
open an account.
3. After registration, the user should be provided with a unique acknowledgement number
so that he can later be given an account number.
The above mentioned functional requirements describe the specific services provided by
the online banking system. These requirements indicate user requirements and specify
that functional requirements may be described at different levels of detail in an online
banking system. With the help of these functional requirements, users can easily view,
search and download registration forms and other information about the bank. On the
other hand, if requirements are not stated properly, they are misinterpreted by software
engineers and user requirements are not met.
The functional requirements should be complete and consistent. Completeness implies
that all the user requirements are defined. Consistency implies that all requirements are
specified clearly without any contradictory definition. Generally, it is observed that
completeness and consistency cannot be achieved in large software or in a complex
system due to the problems that arise while defining the functional requirements of these
systems. The different needs of stakeholders also prevent the achievement of
completeness and consistency. Due to these reasons, requirements may not be obvious
when they are,'first specified and may further lead to inconsistencies in the requirements
specification.
The non-functional requirements (also known as quality requirements) are related to
system attributes such as reliability and response time. Non-functional requirements
arise due to user requirements, budget constraints, organizational policies, and so on.
These requirements are not related directly to any particular function provided by the
system.
Non-functional requirements should be accomplished in software to make it perform
efficiently. For example, if an aeroplane is unable to fulfill reliability requirements, it is
not approved for safe operation. Similarly, if a real time control system is ineffective in
accomplishing non-functional requirements, the control functions cannot operate
correctly.
The description of different types of non-functional requirements is listed below.
1. Product requirements: These requirements specify how software product performs.
Product requirements comprise the following.
2. Efficiency requirements: Describe the extent to which the software makes optimal
use of resources, the speed with which the system executes, and the memory it consumes
for its operation. For example, the system should be able to operate at least three times
faster than the existing system.
3. Reliability requirements: Describe the acceptable failure rate of the software. For
example, the software should be able to operate even if a hazard occurs.
4. Portability requirements: Describe the ease with which the software can be
transferred from one platform to another. For example, it should be easy to port the
software to a different operating system without the need to redesign the entire software.
5. Usability requirements: Describe the ease with which users are able to operate the
software. For example, the software should be able to provide access to functionality with
fewer keystrokes and mouse clicks.
6. Organizational requirements: These requirements are derived from the policies and
procedures of an organization. Organizational requirements comprise the following.
7. Delivery requirements: Specify when the software and its documentation are to be
delivered to the user.
8. Implementation requirements: Describe requirements such as programming
language and design method.
9. Standards requirements: Describe the process standards to be used during software
development. For example, the software should be developed using standards specified
by the ISO and IEEE standards.
10. External requirements: These requirements include all the requirements that affect
the software or its development process externally. External requirements comprise the
following.
11. Interoperability requirements: Define the way in which different computer based
systems will interact with each other in one or more organizations.
12. Ethical requirements: Specify the rules and regulations of the software so that they
are acceptable to users.
13. Legislative requirements: Ensure that the software operates within the legal
jurisdiction. For example, pirated software should not be sold.
Features Measures
Processed transaction/ second
Speed
User/event response time
Screen refresh rate
Training time
Ease of use
Number of help windows
Percentage of target-dependent
Portability
statements
Number of target systems
Requirements which are derived from the application domain of the system instead from
the needs of the users are known as domain requirements. These requirements may
be new functional requirements or specify a method to perform some particular
computations. In addition, these requirements include any constraint that may be present
in the existing functional requirements. As domain requirements reflect the fundamentals
of the application domain, it is important to understand these requirements. Also, if these
requirements are not fulfilled, it may be difficult to make .the system work as desired.
A system can include a number of domain requirements. For example, it may comprise a
design constraint that describes the user interface, which is capable of accessing all the
databases used in a system. It is important for a development team to create databases
and interface designs as per established standards. Similarly, the requirements of the user
such as copyright restrictions and security mechanism for the files and documents used
in the system are also domain requirements. When domain requirements are not
expressed clearly, it can result in the following difficulties.
Problem of understandability: When domain requirements are specified in the
language of application domain (such as mathematical expressions), it becomes difficult
for software engineers to understand them.
Problem of implicitness: When domain experts understand the domain requirements
but do not express these requirements clearly, it may create a problem (due to incomplete
information) for the development team to understand and implement the requirements
in the system.
The requirements engineering process begins with feasibility study of the requirements.
Then requirements elicitation is performed, which focuses on gathering user
requirements. After the requirements are gathered, an analysis is performed, which
further leads to requirements specification. The output of this is stored in the form of
software requirements specification document. Next, the requirements are checked for
their completeness and correctness in requirements validation. Last of all, to understand
and control changes to system requirements, requirements management is performed.
Software Engineering | Classification of Software
Requirements
According to IEEE standard 729, a requirement is defined as follows:
A condition or capability needed by a user to solve a problem or achieve an objective
A condition or capability that must be met or possessed by a system or system component
to satisfy a contract, standard, specification or other formally imposed documents
A documented representation of a condition or capability as in 1 and 2.
A software requirement can be of 3 types:
Functional requirements
Non-functional requirements
Domain requirements
Functional Requirements: These are the requirements that the end user specifically
demands as basic facilities that the system should offer. All these functionalities need to
be necessarily incorporated into the system as a part of the contract. These are
represented or stated in the form of input to be given to the system, the operation
performed and the output expected. They are basically the requirements stated by the
user which one can see directly in the final product, unlike the non-functional
requirements.
For example, in a hospital management system, a doctor should be able to retrieve the
information of his patients. Each high-level functional requirement may involve several
interactions or dialogues between the system and the outside world. In order to
accurately describe the functional requirements, all scenarios must be enumerated.
There are many ways of expressing functional requirements e.g., natural language, a
structured or formatted language with no rigorous syntax and formal specification
language with proper syntax.
Non-functional requirements: These are basically the quality constraints that the
system must satisfy according to the project contract. The priority or extent to which
these factors are implemented varies from one project to other. They are also called
non-behavioral requirements.
They basically deal with issues like:
Portability
Security
Maintainability
Reliability
Scalability
Performance
Reusability
Flexibility
NFR’s are classified into following types:
Interface constraints
Performance constraints: response time, security, storage space, etc.
Operating constraints
Life cycle constraints: mantainability, portability, etc.
Economic constraints
The process of specifying non-functional requirements requires the knowledge of the
functionality of the system, as well as the knowledge of the context within which the
system will operate.
Domain requirements: Domain requirements are the requirements which are
characteristic of a particular category or domain of projects. The basic functions that a
system of a specific domain must necessarily exhibit come under this category. For
instance, in an academic software that maintains records of a school or college, the
functionality of being able to access the list of faculty and list of students of each grade
is a domain requirement. These requirements are therefore identified from that domain
model and are not user specific.