Requirements Engineering for Web Applications: A Comparative Study

The requirements engineering discipline has become more and more important in the last years. Tasks such as the requirements elicitation, the specification of requirements or the requirements validation are essential to assure the quality of the resulting software. The development of Web systems usually involves more heterogeneous stakeholders than the construction of traditional software. In addition, Web systems have additional requirements for the navigational and multimedia aspects as well as for the usability as no training is possible. Therefore a thoroughly requirements analysis is even more relevant. In contrast, most of the methodologies that have been proposed for the development of Web applications focus on the design paying less attention to the requirements engineering. This paper is a comparative study of the requirements handling in Web methodologies showing trends in the use of techniques for capturing, specifying and validating Web requirements

Requerimientos no funcionales para aplicaciones web

Los requerimientos no funcionales de los sistemas software no son un todo homogéneo, hay una falta de consenso para responder preguntas tales como: ¿qué son? ¿cómo se clasifican dentro del contexto de desarrollo de software?, y ¿cómo se clasifican en el desarrollo de aplicaciones Web? Este trabajo presenta el estado de arte del concepto de Requerimientos No Funcionales dentro de la literatura existente en la Ingeniería de Requerimientos y establece como bases conceptuales que los Requerimientos No Funcionales son requerimientos de calidad y son restricciones. Sobre esta base se realiza un estudio comparativo de seis enfoques de desarrollo de aplicaciones Web. Se estudian los procesos de desarrollo que cada una de ellas utiliza para determinar los requerimientos no funcionales; las técnicas de la ingeniería de requerimientos que proponen para su elicitación, especificación, validación y gestión; y se establece en qué fase del ciclo de vida de desarrollo de software identifican y tratan a los requerimientos no funcionales.Non-functional requirements of software systems are not a homogeneous whole; there is a lack of consensus to answer questions such as: what are they? How are classified within the context of software development? And how classify it in Web Applications developing? This text presents the state of art of the concept of non-functional requirements in the existing literature on the Requirements Engineering and establishes the conceptual foundations of non-functional requirements as quality requirements and restrictions. On this basis, we made a comparative study of six approaches of Web applications development. We studied the development processes that each approach uses to determine of non-functional requirements, the engineering techniques proposed for requirements elicitation, specification, validation and management, and established at what stage of software development life cycle they identify and address Non-functional requirements.Facultad de Informátic

A Practical Example for Model-Driven Web Requirements

The number of approaches for Web environments has grown very fast in the last years: HDM, OOHDM, and WSDM were among the first, and now a large number can be found in the literature. With the definition of MDA (Model- Driven Architecture) and the acceptance of MDE (Model-Driven Engineering) techniques in this environment, some groups are working in the use of metamodels and transformations to make their approaches more powerful. UWE (UMLBased Web Engineering) or OOWS (Object-Oriented Web Solutions) are only some examples. However, there are few real experiences with Web Engineering in the enterprise environment, and very few real applications of metamodels and MDE techniques. In this chapter the practical experience of a Web Engineering approach, NDT, in a big project developed in Andalusia is presented. Besides, it shows the usability of metamodels in real environments

Elicitación y especificación de requerimientos no funcionales en aplicaciones web

Este trabajo de tesis presenta lineamientos específicos para la aplicación de Ingeniería de Requerimientos Web al tratamiento de los RNF. Presenta procesos de Elicitación y Especificación de RNF Web y ofrece las plantillas diseñadas particularmente para la captura y especificación de los RNF en los procesos definidos. Si bien actualmente la Ingeniería de Requerimientos proporciona numerosas técnicas y herramientas para identificar, describir, validar y gestionar requerimientos, estos no son aplicados muy a menudo, en el desarrollo de aplicaciones Web. La madurez del proceso de ingeniería de requerimientos parece ser insuficiente, esa insuficiencia demanda nuevos enfoques o evolución de los actuales para el tratamiento adecuado de los RNF. Los RNF de los sistemas software no son un todo homogéneo, hay falta de consenso para responder a los interrogantes: ¿Qué son? ¿Cómo se clasifican dentro del contexto de desarrollo de software? y ¿Cómo se clasifican en el desarrollo de aplicaciones Web? Este trabajo parte de una revisión del estado de arte de los conceptos de RNF en la literatura de la Ingeniería de Requerimientos y establece como bases conceptuales que los RNF son requerimientos de calidad y son restricciones. Luego ofrece un análisis comparativo de seis enfoques existentes de desarrollo de aplicaciones Web para estudiar qué tratamiento aplican a los RNF, en el cual se pudo determinar que las metodologías de aplicaciones Web estudiadas: Contemplan los RNF, aunque se carece de consenso en su significado. No disponen de técnicas específicas para la elicitación de RNF, ni lineamientos uniformes para la especificación y la validación. No brindan técnicas que soporten el tratamiento de los RNF a lo largo del ciclo de vida. Hay carencia de consenso para establecer en qué fase del ciclo de vida de desarrollo se identifican los RNF. Hay RNF que no son identificados durante la fase de relevamiento y análisis. A partir de este análisis y dada la importancia de los RNF, se proponen procesos para la elicitación y especificación de los RNF Web (de calidad y restricciones), se describen las plantillas propuestas que dan soporte a los procesos y finalmente se presenta la validación de los conceptos y técnicas propuestos mediante un caso de estudio en un proyecto real.This thesis introduces specifics guidelines to apply Web Requirements Engineering to the treatment of Non-Functional Requirements. It introduces the process of Elicitation and Specification for Web Non-Functional Requirements and offers spreadsheets designed to capture and specify Non-Functional Requirements in the defined processes. While at present Requirement Engineering has numerous techniques and tools to identify, describe, validate and manage requirements, these are not frequently applied in the development of Web applications. The maturity of the Requirements Engineering process seems insufficient; this insufficiency demands new approaches or the evolution of current process to the correct treatment of Non-Functional Requirements. Non-Functional Requirements of software systems are not homogenous; there is a lack of consensus to answer the following questions: What are Non-Functional Requirements? How they are classified within the context of software development? and How the Non-Functional Requirements are classified within the development of web software application? This thesis starts with a revision of the state of art of the concept of Non-Functional Requirements in Requirements Engineering literature and establishes as conceptual foundations that Non-Functional Requirements are quality requirements and restrictions. Then, there is a comparative analysis of six different existing approaches in Web application development to study what treatment applies to Non-Functional Requirements, in which methodologies of the Web applications studied: Non-Functional Requirements are considered, but there is no consensus in their meaning. There are neither specifics techniques for elicitation of Non-Functional Requirements nor uniform guidelines for the specification and validation. There are no techniques supporting the treatment of the Non-Functional Requirements along the lifetime cycle. There is a lack of consensus to establish within which phase of development lifetime cycle Non-Functional Requirements are identified. There are Non-Functional Requirements that are not indentified during requirement capture and analysis phases. After this analysis and the give importance of the Non-Functional Requirements, a process for the elicitation and specification of the Web Non-Functional Requirements (quality and restrictions) is proposed, exposed spreadsheets are described to support processes and finally, validations of the concepts and techniques are introduced applied to a real project.Facultad de Informátic

A requirements framework for novice web developers

This paper introduces a requirements framework intended to guide novice web developers. The work is based on two earlier studies which found that the requirements phase is not well served in web development methods and that there is no agreed set of requirements from practitioners as to what they would like to see in a web development method. The requirements framework outlined here is developed by novice practitioners and later evaluated by them as flexible, simple and easy to use

Automated Functional Testing based on the Navigation of Web Applications

Web applications are becoming more and more complex. Testing such applications is an intricate hard and time-consuming activity. Therefore, testing is often poorly performed or skipped by practitioners. Test automation can help to avoid this situation. Hence, this paper presents a novel approach to perform automated software testing for web applications based on its navigation. On the one hand, web navigation is the process of traversing a web application using a browser. On the other hand, functional requirements are actions that an application must do. Therefore, the evaluation of the correct navigation of web applications results in the assessment of the specified functional requirements. The proposed method to perform the automation is done in four levels: test case generation, test data derivation, test case execution, and test case reporting. This method is driven by three kinds of inputs: i) UML models; ii) Selenium scripts; iii) XML files. We have implemented our approach in an open-source testing framework named Automatic Testing Platform. The validation of this work has been carried out by means of a case study, in which the target is a real invoice management system developed using a model-driven approach.Comment: In Proceedings WWV 2011, arXiv:1108.208

Improving Knowledge Retrieval in Digital Libraries Applying Intelligent Techniques

Nowadays an enormous quantity of heterogeneous and distributed information is stored in the digital University. Exploring online collections to find knowledge relevant to a user’s interests is a challenging work. The artificial intelligence and Semantic Web provide a common framework that allows knowledge to be shared and reused in an efficient way. In this work we propose a comprehensive approach for discovering E-learning objects in large digital collections based on analysis of recorded semantic metadata in those objects and the application of expert system technologies. We have used Case Based-Reasoning methodology to develop a prototype for supporting efficient retrieval knowledge from online repositories. We suggest a conceptual architecture for a semantic search engine. OntoUS is a collaborative effort that proposes a new form of interaction between users and digital libraries, where the latter are adapted to users and their surroundings

A quality management based on the Quality Model life cycle

Managing quality is a hard and expensive task that involves the execution and control of processes and techniques. For a good quality management, it is important to know the current state and the objective to be achieved. It is essential to take into account with a Quality Model that specifies the purposes of managing quality. QuEF (Quality Evaluation Framework) is a framework to manage quality in MDWE (Model-driven Web Engineering). This paper suggests managing quality but pointing out the Quality Model life cycle. The purpose is to converge toward a quality continuous improvement by means of reducing effort and time.Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación TIN2010-20057-C03-02Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación TIN 2010-12312-EJunta de Andalucía TIC-578

Simulation in manufacturing and business: A review

Copyright @ 2009 Elsevier B.V.This paper reports the results of a review of simulation applications published within peer-reviewed literature between 1997 and 2006 to provide an up-to-date picture of the role of simulation techniques within manufacturing and business. The review is characterised by three factors: wide coverage, broad scope of the simulation techniques, and a focus on real-world applications. A structured methodology was followed to narrow down the search from around 20,000 papers to 281. Results include interesting trends and patterns. For instance, although discrete event simulation is the most popular technique, it has lower stakeholder engagement than other techniques, such as system dynamics or gaming. This is highly correlated with modelling lead time and purpose. Considering application areas, modelling is mostly used in scheduling. Finally, this review shows an increasing interest in hybrid modelling as an approach to cope with complex enterprise-wide systems