Requirements management
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My role at work is changing, I'm taking on requirements management and test development which is the slot I've been working towards for a couple of years now. My question is are there any requirements maangment packages that people would recommend? This will be working with defined standards, what is broadcast in practice etc. This will be one user initially but possibly multple users in the future and I will be publishing requirements to software engineers. Thanks. Elaine :rose:
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We like using Enterprise Architect for this. What we tend to do is define a single solution which we use to track the requirements, so that we can ensure traceability by using the same model to hold the use cases. It's a lot more robust than trying to manage via Excel/Word.
"WPF has many lovers. It's a veritable porn star!" - Josh Smith
As Braveheart once said, "You can take our freedom but you'll never take our Hobnobs!" - Martin Hughes.
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We like using Enterprise Architect for this. What we tend to do is define a single solution which we use to track the requirements, so that we can ensure traceability by using the same model to hold the use cases. It's a lot more robust than trying to manage via Excel/Word.
"WPF has many lovers. It's a veritable porn star!" - Josh Smith
As Braveheart once said, "You can take our freedom but you'll never take our Hobnobs!" - Martin Hughes.
I take it you mean Visual Studio Enterprise Architect? Unfortunately this is embedded development for SoCs so only a couple of people in the team have it. I use C# for tools and utilities, not a lot so far but that is going to grow in the long term. Thanks for the suggesetion.
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It's a lot more complex than that - this is dealing with DTV broadcasting (terrestrial, satellite, cable and IP) across most of the world, technical standards from 40+ countries plus what they do in practice. In a word - EEK! There is some NASA free software from the Goddard Space Centre that look interesting, got a lot of reading to do. The upside of this software is I can put the documents under CelarCase and we can mange version control and distribution throughout the company by that. Plus I can control who is able to change them.
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Ouch! In that case, good luck - you'll probably need it. Will ask some BAs at work on Tuesday (they're off tomorrow), but I think they pretty much use Word + Excel.
Cheers, Vikram. (Got my troika of CCCs!)
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I take it you mean Visual Studio Enterprise Architect? Unfortunately this is embedded development for SoCs so only a couple of people in the team have it. I use C# for tools and utilities, not a lot so far but that is going to grow in the long term. Thanks for the suggesetion.
Join the cool kids - Come fold with us[^]
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My role at work is changing, I'm taking on requirements management and test development which is the slot I've been working towards for a couple of years now. My question is are there any requirements maangment packages that people would recommend? This will be working with defined standards, what is broadcast in practice etc. This will be one user initially but possibly multple users in the future and I will be publishing requirements to software engineers. Thanks. Elaine :rose:
Join the cool kids - Come fold with us[^]
Trollslayer wrote:
and I will be publishing requirements to software engineers.
So I'm assuming you're talking about functional requirements rather than design / implementation requirements? Personally, I still look at my experiences working on the security system of the MX Missile Train (thankfully cancelled) as a good way of dealing with requirements, as well as other more noble gov't projects I worked on then, like multispectral analysis. The original requirements were written as a plain text document, then we worked with the gov't to reduce the verbose statements to simple one line tests to form an Acceptance Test Procedure. It was interesting to discover the holes in the original requirements doc, which then itself underwent revision. But frankly, I love working with an ATP. The problem is, just testing functional requirements isn't often enough, you actually have to figure out how to test the overall architecture and also the details of the implementation. It becomes very hard to determine that, while the system meets the functional requirements at the moment, is the system meet the requirements for extensibility, often against equipment or requirements that can't be physically tested because the hardware doesn't exist yet. I'm not sure I'm being clear enough, but the idea is, functional requirements don't usually determine whether the implementation is done correctly, even if some handwaving about "maintainability" and "extensibility" is made mention of in the original requirements doc. "Handwaving" being the problem. As to management packages, what are you trying to "manage"? Compliance? Or are you trying to determine other things, like budget, development time, etc.? We were quite happy with Word. So my question back to you, since you're now taking on this new position, you might as well be your first guinea pig--what are YOUR requirements for requirements management? If you can identify those, you should be able to vet any potential products rather quickly. Marc
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My role at work is changing, I'm taking on requirements management and test development which is the slot I've been working towards for a couple of years now. My question is are there any requirements maangment packages that people would recommend? This will be working with defined standards, what is broadcast in practice etc. This will be one user initially but possibly multple users in the future and I will be publishing requirements to software engineers. Thanks. Elaine :rose:
Join the cool kids - Come fold with us[^]
For bigger projects I've used DOORS (previously by Swedish Telelogic now IBM). Very flexible and very customisable, expensive. For smaller projects I've used Trac (by Edgewall Software). Simple and web based, lots of extensions, free software. I like both. Hope it helps :) /M
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My role at work is changing, I'm taking on requirements management and test development which is the slot I've been working towards for a couple of years now. My question is are there any requirements maangment packages that people would recommend? This will be working with defined standards, what is broadcast in practice etc. This will be one user initially but possibly multple users in the future and I will be publishing requirements to software engineers. Thanks. Elaine :rose:
Join the cool kids - Come fold with us[^]
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Trollslayer wrote:
and I will be publishing requirements to software engineers.
So I'm assuming you're talking about functional requirements rather than design / implementation requirements? Personally, I still look at my experiences working on the security system of the MX Missile Train (thankfully cancelled) as a good way of dealing with requirements, as well as other more noble gov't projects I worked on then, like multispectral analysis. The original requirements were written as a plain text document, then we worked with the gov't to reduce the verbose statements to simple one line tests to form an Acceptance Test Procedure. It was interesting to discover the holes in the original requirements doc, which then itself underwent revision. But frankly, I love working with an ATP. The problem is, just testing functional requirements isn't often enough, you actually have to figure out how to test the overall architecture and also the details of the implementation. It becomes very hard to determine that, while the system meets the functional requirements at the moment, is the system meet the requirements for extensibility, often against equipment or requirements that can't be physically tested because the hardware doesn't exist yet. I'm not sure I'm being clear enough, but the idea is, functional requirements don't usually determine whether the implementation is done correctly, even if some handwaving about "maintainability" and "extensibility" is made mention of in the original requirements doc. "Handwaving" being the problem. As to management packages, what are you trying to "manage"? Compliance? Or are you trying to determine other things, like budget, development time, etc.? We were quite happy with Word. So my question back to you, since you're now taking on this new position, you might as well be your first guinea pig--what are YOUR requirements for requirements management? If you can identify those, you should be able to vet any potential products rather quickly. Marc
Marc Clifton wrote:
So I'm assuming you're talking about functional requirements rather than design / implementation requirements?
Yes, this is feeding the requirements into the software teams and I am responsible for the test development. There will be unit testing but that is a separate task and is design related. Naturally there will be a waterfall method with iterations, I'm not treating it as a black box. In digital broadcasting there are messages containing various tables which contain various descriptors. Some standards relate to system functionality, some how tables and descriptors operate to provide functionality. At the moment it looks like I will have to provide use cases and their relation to various standards and tables/descriptors. This is what drives the software development to cover functionality and compliance. The two are not the same by the way since broadcasters sometimes ignore their own standards. Budget, development time etc. are the responsiblity of the software development teams. For a few countries/operators such as the UK there are ATPs in the form of test suites with content and procedures which are a great help but have holes (of course), you are right about ATPs. Initially I need to determine use and test cases, standards coverage and table/descriptor use. A custom application would be nice. RAC anyone? *ducks* I thought about Word, Excel etc. but tracking the relationships between standards/customer requirements, tables/descriptors, use cases (which aren't always in standards) and test cases is too complex. A database could store the information and relationships but interfacing efficiently would need a lot of work. It will probably take one to two years to get everything rolling nicely, at first any reduction in chaos will be an improvement. :-D Thanks for the help Marc. Elaine :rose:
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Thanks Suart, I'll look. As I said to Marc below the design will be handled by the core developers, UML might be useful but it's the relationships between external standards/requirements, message processing, use cases and test cases that I'm looking for primarily. Enterprise Architect looks a very good candidate and is reasonable priced. Elaine :rose:
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I take it you mean Visual Studio Enterprise Architect? Unfortunately this is embedded development for SoCs so only a couple of people in the team have it. I use C# for tools and utilities, not a lot so far but that is going to grow in the long term. Thanks for the suggesetion.
Join the cool kids - Come fold with us[^]
Dear lord no - I mean a proper one[^].
"WPF has many lovers. It's a veritable porn star!" - Josh Smith
As Braveheart once said, "You can take our freedom but you'll never take our Hobnobs!" - Martin Hughes.
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We like using Enterprise Architect for this. What we tend to do is define a single solution which we use to track the requirements, so that we can ensure traceability by using the same model to hold the use cases. It's a lot more robust than trying to manage via Excel/Word.
"WPF has many lovers. It's a veritable porn star!" - Josh Smith
As Braveheart once said, "You can take our freedom but you'll never take our Hobnobs!" - Martin Hughes.
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Stuart Dootson wrote:
DOORS
Shudder - one of our clients uses that and it's a complete PITA trying to get anything out of them. It does have one thing going for it, it's DOORS for Windows.
"WPF has many lovers. It's a veritable porn star!" - Josh Smith
As Braveheart once said, "You can take our freedom but you'll never take our Hobnobs!" - Martin Hughes.
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Stuart pointed me to the one you mean, I'll have a look at it shortly. Thanks. Elaine :rose:
Join the cool kids - Come fold with us[^]
Ping me offline if you want more details on how we use it. (It was fun saying that).
"WPF has many lovers. It's a veritable porn star!" - Josh Smith
As Braveheart once said, "You can take our freedom but you'll never take our Hobnobs!" - Martin Hughes.
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Marc Clifton wrote:
So I'm assuming you're talking about functional requirements rather than design / implementation requirements?
Yes, this is feeding the requirements into the software teams and I am responsible for the test development. There will be unit testing but that is a separate task and is design related. Naturally there will be a waterfall method with iterations, I'm not treating it as a black box. In digital broadcasting there are messages containing various tables which contain various descriptors. Some standards relate to system functionality, some how tables and descriptors operate to provide functionality. At the moment it looks like I will have to provide use cases and their relation to various standards and tables/descriptors. This is what drives the software development to cover functionality and compliance. The two are not the same by the way since broadcasters sometimes ignore their own standards. Budget, development time etc. are the responsiblity of the software development teams. For a few countries/operators such as the UK there are ATPs in the form of test suites with content and procedures which are a great help but have holes (of course), you are right about ATPs. Initially I need to determine use and test cases, standards coverage and table/descriptor use. A custom application would be nice. RAC anyone? *ducks* I thought about Word, Excel etc. but tracking the relationships between standards/customer requirements, tables/descriptors, use cases (which aren't always in standards) and test cases is too complex. A database could store the information and relationships but interfacing efficiently would need a lot of work. It will probably take one to two years to get everything rolling nicely, at first any reduction in chaos will be an improvement. :-D Thanks for the help Marc. Elaine :rose:
Join the cool kids - Come fold with us[^]
Trollslayer wrote:
A database could store the information and relationships but interfacing efficiently would need a lot of work.
Well, if you're ever interested in a custom solution.... :)
Trollslayer wrote:
Thanks for the help Marc.
You're welcome! Marc
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Marc Clifton wrote:
So I'm assuming you're talking about functional requirements rather than design / implementation requirements?
Yes, this is feeding the requirements into the software teams and I am responsible for the test development. There will be unit testing but that is a separate task and is design related. Naturally there will be a waterfall method with iterations, I'm not treating it as a black box. In digital broadcasting there are messages containing various tables which contain various descriptors. Some standards relate to system functionality, some how tables and descriptors operate to provide functionality. At the moment it looks like I will have to provide use cases and their relation to various standards and tables/descriptors. This is what drives the software development to cover functionality and compliance. The two are not the same by the way since broadcasters sometimes ignore their own standards. Budget, development time etc. are the responsiblity of the software development teams. For a few countries/operators such as the UK there are ATPs in the form of test suites with content and procedures which are a great help but have holes (of course), you are right about ATPs. Initially I need to determine use and test cases, standards coverage and table/descriptor use. A custom application would be nice. RAC anyone? *ducks* I thought about Word, Excel etc. but tracking the relationships between standards/customer requirements, tables/descriptors, use cases (which aren't always in standards) and test cases is too complex. A database could store the information and relationships but interfacing efficiently would need a lot of work. It will probably take one to two years to get everything rolling nicely, at first any reduction in chaos will be an improvement. :-D Thanks for the help Marc. Elaine :rose:
Join the cool kids - Come fold with us[^]
Trollslayer wrote:
A custom application would be nice.
Come up with your requirements and let's talk.
"WPF has many lovers. It's a veritable porn star!" - Josh Smith
As Braveheart once said, "You can take our freedom but you'll never take our Hobnobs!" - Martin Hughes.
-
Ping me offline if you want more details on how we use it. (It was fun saying that).
"WPF has many lovers. It's a veritable porn star!" - Josh Smith
As Braveheart once said, "You can take our freedom but you'll never take our Hobnobs!" - Martin Hughes.
-
Trollslayer wrote:
A custom application would be nice.
Come up with your requirements and let's talk.
"WPF has many lovers. It's a veritable porn star!" - Josh Smith
As Braveheart once said, "You can take our freedom but you'll never take our Hobnobs!" - Martin Hughes.
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My role at work is changing, I'm taking on requirements management and test development which is the slot I've been working towards for a couple of years now. My question is are there any requirements maangment packages that people would recommend? This will be working with defined standards, what is broadcast in practice etc. This will be one user initially but possibly multple users in the future and I will be publishing requirements to software engineers. Thanks. Elaine :rose:
Join the cool kids - Come fold with us[^]
QPack by Orcanos www.orcanos.com
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My role at work is changing, I'm taking on requirements management and test development which is the slot I've been working towards for a couple of years now. My question is are there any requirements maangment packages that people would recommend? This will be working with defined standards, what is broadcast in practice etc. This will be one user initially but possibly multple users in the future and I will be publishing requirements to software engineers. Thanks. Elaine :rose:
Join the cool kids - Come fold with us[^]
Welcome to my world. (I am a process developer). You may want to have a look at Polarion[^]. They have a solution based on Office tools which are being put under revision control, with added traceability. Very clever. DOORS is a blockbuster, but it requires a good knowledge of requirement theory to be used intelligently. Otherwise, it has no added value compared to Excel and a bunch of macros. I once saw a demo of the MKS suite, which was not bad, but I was disappointed by the requirement part. It was a few years ago and was a quite young product (as opposed to source and integrity), so it may be worth having a look at it. My advice would be to have a solid idea of how you want to handle your requirements, even maybe starting with Word+Excel. Then you could easily identify features that would bring you a real time saving. So, theory first -
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Requirements management….I've used DOORS (now sold by IBM) - that's not a product I like…then there's Reqtify, which is a tool for managing traceability from different sources…then there's a product from MKS which seems to be well regarded. These are all quite expensive products, however...
Java, Basic, who cares - it's all a bunch of tree-hugging hippy cr*p CodeProject MVP for 2010 - who'd'a thunk it!
Oh my, one more manager in the world is born... I've used fogbugz before. They have some nice features, and are much more pleasant to use for programmers than any other issue trackers out there: http://www.fogcreek.com/fogbugz/[^] I am sure you could wrangle in some requirements in there.