Requirements Engineering is common sense, but it is perceived
to be difficult and is not well understood. For these reasons
it is generally not very well done. The ever-increasing pressures
on an organisation are often given as the main reasons for
not introducing a more disciplined approach to requirements
engineering. However, it is these very pressures that make
it even more important for the requirements engineer to help
the organisation do the job properly.
Systems engineering is critical in today's industry and
requirements engineering is an important aspect of that overall
process. A good process is key to requirements engineering
- it determines how efficiently and rapidly products can be
generated. This is particularly important in a global competitive
market where the 'time to market' and meeting stakeholder
requirements are the key success factors.
Requirements engineering is also about management and hence
issues in relation to requirements and management blend to
show how requirements can be used to manage systems development.
The book is concerned with engineering requirements and how
systems engineers may be helped to create better requirements.
A generic process is presented which assists the reader in
gaining a good understanding of the essence of requirements
engineering. The process is then instantiated for the problem
and solution domains of development. The book also addresses
the concept of system modelling and presents various techniques
and methods which are widely used. An important feature of
the book is the presentation of approaches to traceability,
the way in which it is captured and metrics which can be derived
from traceability. Finally the book presents an overview of
DOORS which is a tool for requirements management. A case
study is used to illustrate the process presented in the book
and the features of the tool.
This book should be read by those systems and requirements
engineers in industry, who, as practitioners, are keen to
gain knowledge of using requirements engineering for system
development. The book will also be of interest to final year
undergraduate students in Computer Science, Software Engineering
and Systems Engineering studying a course in Requirements
Engineering and also to postgraduate research students in
Computer Science or and other flavours of Engineering.
The approach taken in the book is based on current research
in Requirements Engineering, however it has not only taken
the academic view but has also built substantially on current
experience of working in industry to enable system engineers
to manage requirements (and projects) more successfully. It
provides a snapshot, in this rapidly evolving subject, of
what we see as best practice in Requirements Engineering today.
Elizabeth Hull
Ken Jackson
Jeremy Dick
May 2002
|
