Object-Oriented Software Engineering

Using UML, Patterns, and Java

Chapter 4
Requirements Elicitation
 Outline

• Today:
• Motivation: Software Lifecycle
• Requirements elicitation challenges
• Problem statement
• Requirements specification
• Types of requirements
• Validating requirements

Bernd Bruegge & Allen H. Dutoit Object-Oriented Software Engineering: Using UML, Patterns, and Java 2
Bernd Bruegge & Allen H. Dutoit Object-Oriented Software Engineering: Using UML, Patterns, and Java 3
 Software Lifecycle Activities ...and their
models

Requirements System Object Implemen-

Elicitation Analysis Design Design tation Testing

Implemented By
Expressed in Structured By Verified
Realized By
Terms Of By

class...
class...
class... ?
class.... ?
Use Case Application Solution
Domain Subsystems Source Test
Model Domain
Objects Code Cases
Objects

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 What does the Customer say?

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 First step in identifying the Requirements:
System identification
• Two questions need to be answered:
1. How can we identify the purpose of a system?
• What are the requirements, what are the constraints?
2. What is inside, what is outside the system?
• These two questions are answered during
requirements elicitation and analysis
• Requirements elicitation:
• Definition of the system in terms understood by the
customer and/or user (“Requirements specification”)
• Analysis:
• Definition of the system in terms understood by the
developer (Technical specification, “Analysis model”)
• Requirements Process: Consists of the activities
Requirements Elicitation and Analysis.
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 Software Lifecycle Activities
Requirements Process

Requirements System Detailed Implemen-

Analysis Testing
Elicitation Design Design tation

Implemented
Expressed in By
Structured By Realized By
Terms Of Verified
By

class...
class...
class... ?
class.... ?
Use Case Application Solution
Domain Subsystems Source Test
Model Domain
Objects Code Case Model
Objects

Bernd Bruegge & Allen H. Dutoit Object-Oriented Software Engineering: Using UML, Patterns, and Java 7
 Techniques to elicit requirements

• Bridging the gap between end user and

developer:
• Questionnaires: Asking the end user a list of pre-
selected questions
• Task Analysis: Observing end users in their
operational environment
• Scenarios: Describe the use of the system as a series
of interactions between a specific end user and the
system
• Use cases: Abstractions that describe a class of
scenarios.

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 Scenarios
• Scenario
• “A narrative description of what people do and
experience as they try to make use of computer systems
and applications”
• [M. Carroll, Scenario-Based Design, Wiley, 1995]
• A concrete, focused, informal description of a single
feature of the system used by a single actor
• A textual description of the usage of a system. The
description is written from an end user’s point of view
• A scenario can include text, video, pictures and story
boards. It usually also contains details about the work
place, social situations and resource constraints.

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 Scenario-Based Design

Scenario-Based Design: The use of scenarios in a

software lifecycle activity
• Scenario-based design is iterative
• Each scenario should be considered as a work
document to be augmented and rearranged (“iterated
upon”) when the requirements, the client acceptance
criteria or the deployment situation changes.

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 Heuristics for finding scenarios

• Don’t rely on questions and questionnaires alone

• Insist on task observation if the system already
exists (interface engineering or reengineering)
• Ask to speak to the end user, not just to the client
• Expect resistance and try to overcome it.

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 Scenario example: Warehouse on Fire

• Bob, driving down main street in his patrol car notices

smoke coming out of a warehouse. His partner, Alice,
reports the emergency from her car.
• Alice enters the address of the building into her wearable
computer, a brief description of its location (i.e., north
west corner), and an emergency level.
• She confirms her input and waits for an acknowledgment;
• John, the dispatcher, is alerted to the emergency by a
beep of his workstation. He reviews the information
submitted by Alice and acknowledges the report. He
allocates a fire unit and sends the estimated arrival time
(EAT) to Alice.
• Alice received the acknowledgment and the EAT..

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 Observations about the Warehouse on Fire
Scenario
• It is a concrete scenario
• It describes a single instance of reporting a
fire incident
• It does not describe all possible situations in
which a fire can be reported

• Participating actors
• Bob, Alice and John.

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 It’s your turn…

• Write a scenario for your term project…

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After the scenarios are formulated
• Find all the use cases in the scenario that
specify all instances of how to report a fire
• Example from the Warehouse on Fire scenario:
• “Bob… notices smoke coming out of a warehouse. His partner,
Alice, reports the emergency from her car”
• “Report Emergency” is a candidate for a use case
• Describe each of these use cases in more detail
• Participating actors
• Describe the entry condition
• Describe the flow of events
• Describe the exit condition
• Describe exceptions
• Describe nonfunctional requirements
• The set of all use cases is the basis for the
Functional Model(see next lecture)
 Requirements Elicitation: Difficulties and
Challenges
• Accurate communication about the domain and
the system
• People with different backgrounds must collaborate to
bridge the gap between end users and developers
• Client and end users have application domain
knowledge
• Developers have solution domain knowledge
• Identification of an appropriate system
(Definition of the system boundary)
• Provision of an unambiguous specification
• Leaving out unintended features

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 Example of an Ambiguous Specification

During an experiment, a laser beam was

directed from earth to a mirror on the Space
Shuttle Discovery

The laser beam was supposed to be reflected

back towards a mountain top 10,023 feet high
The operator entered the elevation as “10023”

The light beam never hit the mountain top

What was the problem?

The computer interpreted the number in miles...

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 Example of an Unintended Feature
From the News: London underground
train leaves station without driver!
What happened?
• A passenger door was stuck and did not close
• The driver left his train to close the passenger
door
• He left the driver door open
• He relied on the specification that said the train
does not move if at least one door is open
• When he shut the passenger door,
the train left the station without him. Why?
• The driver door was not treated
as a door in the source code!
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 Requirements Process
Problem Statement

Requirements
Elicitation Use Case
Diagrams

Non-functional Req. Functional Model

Sequence
Diagrams
Analysis

Class State
Analysis Object Model Dynamic Model
Diagrams Diagrams

System Activity
Design Diagrams
UML Activity Diagram
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 Requirements Specification vs Analysis
Model
Both are models focusing on the requirements
from the user’s view of the system
• The requirements specification uses natural
language (derived from the problem statement)
• Definition of the system in terms understood by the
customer and/or user
• The analysis model uses a formal or semi-formal
notation
• Definition of the system in terms understood by the
developer

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 Types of Requirements

• Functional requirements
• Describe the interactions between the system and its
environment independent from the implementation
“An operator must be able to define a new game”
• Nonfunctional requirements
• Aspects not directly related to functional behavior
“The response time must be less than 1 second”
“The server must be available 24 hours a day”
• Constraints
• Imposed by the client or the environment
“The implementation language must be Java”
• Also called “Pseudo requirements”.

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 Functional vs. Nonfunctional Requirements

Functional Requirements Nonfunctional Requirements

• Describe user tasks • Describe properties of the
which the system system or the domain
needs to support
• Phrased as actions • Phrased as constraints or
“Advertise a new league” negative assertions
“Schedule tournament” “All user inputs should be
acknowledged within 1
“Notify an interest group”
second”
“A system crash should not
result in data loss”.

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 Types of Nonfunctional Requirements

• Usability • Implementation
• Reliability • Interface
• Robustness • Operation
• Safety • Packaging
• Performance • Legal
• Response time
• Licensing (GPL, LGPL)
• Scalability
• Certification
• Throughput
• Regulation
• Availability
• Supportability
• Adaptability
• Maintainability Constraints or
Quality requirements Pseudo requirements
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 Nonfunctional Requirements: Examples

• “Spectators must be able to watch a match

without prior registration and without prior
knowledge of the match.”
 Usability Requirement
• “The system must support 10 parallel
tournaments”
 Performance Requirement
• “The operator must be able to add new games
without modifications to the existing system.”
 Supportability Requirement

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 Pseudo Requirements (constraints)
• Implementation requirements are constraints on the
implementation of the system, including the use of specific tools,
programming languages, or hardware platforms.

• Interface requirements are constraints imposed by external

systems, including legacy systems and interchange formats.

• Operations requirements are constraints on the administration

and management of the system in the operational setting.

• Packaging requirements are constraints on the actual delivery

of the system (e.g., constraints on the installation media for
setting up the software).

• Legal requirements are concerned with licensing, regulation, and

certification issues.

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 What should not be in the Requirements?

• System structure, implementation technology

• Development methodology
• Development environment
• Implementation language
• Reusability

• It is desirable that none of these above are

constrained by the client.
• Fight for it!

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 Requirements Validation
Requirements validation is a quality assurance
step, usually performed after requirements
elicitation or after analysis
• Correctness:
• The requirements represent the client’s view

• Completeness:
• All possible scenarios, in which the system can be used,
are described

• Consistency:
• There are no requirements that contradict each other.

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 Requirements Validation (2)
• Clarity:
• Requirements can only be interpreted in one way

• Realism:
• Requirements can be implemented and delivered

• Traceability:
• Each system component and behavior can be traced to a
set of functional requirements

• Verifiability:
• Once the system is built, repeatable tests can be
designed to demonstrate that the system fulfills the
requirements specification.
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 • Examples of non-verifiable requirements:
• The product shall have a good user interface.
—Good is not defined.

• The product shall be error free.

—Requires large amount of resources to establish.

• The product shall respond to the user with 1 second for

most cases.
—“Most cases” is not defined.

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 Problems with requirements validation

• Requirements change quickly during

requirements elicitation

• Inconsistencies are easily added with each

change

• Tool support is needed!

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 Different Types of Requirements Elicitation
• Greenfield Engineering
• Development starts from scratch, no prior system exists,
requirements come from end users and clients
• Triggered by user needs
• Example: Develop a game from scratch.
• Re-engineering
• Re-design and/or re-implementation of an existing system
using newer technology
• Triggered by technology enabler
• Example: Reengineer an existing game
• Interface Engineering
• Provision of existing services in a new environment
• Triggered by technology enabler or new market needs
• Example: Interface to an existing game, the game was
developed for a local computer, now we want to offer a
multiplayer-version
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 Prioritizing Requirements

• High priority (“Core requirements”)

• Addressed during analysis, design, and implementation
• must be demonstrated successfully during client
acceptance

• Medium priority (“Optional requirements”)

• Addressed during analysis and design
• Usually implemented in the second iteration

• Low priority (“Fancy requirements”)

• Addressed only during analysis
• Illustrates how the system is going to be used in the
future with not yet available technology.

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 Requirements Analysis Document Template
1. Introduction
2. Current system
3. Proposed system
3.1 Overview
3.2 Functional requirements
3.3 Nonfunctional requirements
3.4 Constraints (“Pseudo requirements”)
3.5 System models
3.5.1 Scenarios
3.5.2 Use case model
3.5.3 Object model
Analysis 3.5.3.1 Data dictionary
(Chapter 5) 3.5.3.2 Class diagrams
3.5.4 Dynamic models
3.5.5 User interface
4. Glossary

Bruegge & Dutoit, 3rd edition, pp. 152

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 Section 3.3 Nonfunctional Requirements

3.3.1 User interface and human factors

3.3.2 Documentation
3.3.3 Hardware considerations
3.3.4 Performance characteristics
3.3.5 Error handling and extreme conditions
3.3.6 System interfacing
3.3.7 Quality issues
3.3.8 System modifications
3.3.9 Physical environment
3.3.10 Security issues
3.3.11 Resources and management issues
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 Nonfunctional Requirements
(Questions to overcome “Writers block”)

User interface and human factors

• What type of user will be using the system?
• Will more than one type of user be using the
system?
• What training will be required for each type of user?
• Is it important that the system is easy to learn?
• Should users be protected from making errors?
• What input/output devices are available
Documentation
• What kind of documentation is required?
• What audience is to be addressed by each
document?

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 Nonfunctional Requirements (2)

Hardware considerations
• What hardware is the proposed system to be used on?
• What are the characteristics of the target hardware,
including memory size and auxiliary storage space?
Performance characteristics
• Are there speed, throughput, response time constraints
on the system?
• Are there size or capacity constraints on the data to be
processed by the system?
Error handling and extreme conditions
• How should the system respond to input errors?
• How should the system respond to extreme conditions?

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 Nonfunctional Requirements (3)

System interfacing
• Is input coming from systems outside the proposed
system?
• Is output going to systems outside the proposed system?
• Are there restrictions on the format or medium that must
be used for input or output?
Quality issues
• What are the requirements for reliability?
• Must the system trap faults?
• What is the time for restarting the system after a failure?
• Is there an acceptable downtime per 24-hour period?
• Is it important that the system be portable?

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 Nonfunctional Requirements (4)

System Modifications
• What parts of the system are likely to be modified?
• What sorts of modifications are expected?
Physical Environment
• Where will the target equipment operate?
• Is the target equipment in one or several locations?
• Will the environmental conditions be ordinary?
Security Issues
• Must access to data or the system be controlled?
• Is physical security an issue?

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 Nonfunctional Requirements (5)

Resources and Management Issues

• How often will the system be backed up?
• Who will be responsible for the back up?
• Who is responsible for system installation?
• Who will be responsible for system maintenance?

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 It’s your turn…

• Determine functional and non-functional

requirements for your term project…

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