Towards Crowdsourcing for Requirements Engineering

Crowdsourcing is an emerging, typically online, distributed problem solving and production model where a problem is solved through the involvement of a large number of people. In this study, we investigate the potential of crowdsourcing in aiding Requirements Engineering. Although the whole area is still to be explored fully, we focus on the Requirements Elicitation stage. In this paper, we survey the literature on crowdsourcing in a variety of disciplines and deduce a set of features which characterize its main constructs; the crowd and the crowd-sourcers. We then conduct two focus groups to explore the relationship between these features and the quality of requirements elicited via crowdsourcing. The analysis will lead to anumber of hypotheses to confirm and enhance in a future research in the area. The ultimate goal is to systematically develop crowdsourcing platforms for Requirements Engineering and guarantee correctness and maximize efficiency

Using mobile RE tools to give end-users their own voice

Researchers highlight end-user involvement in system design as an important concept for developing useful and usable solutions. However, end-user involvement in software engineering is still an open-ended topic. Novel paradigms such as service-oriented computing strengthen the need for more active end-user involvement in order to provide systems that are tailored to individual end-user needs. Our work is based on the fact that the majority of end-users are familiar with mobile devices and use an increasing number of mobile applications. A mobile tool enabling end-user led requirements elicitation could be just one of many applications installed on end-users' mobile devices. In this paper, we present a framework of end-user involvement in requirements elicitation which motivates our research. The main contribution of our research is a tool-supported requirements elicitation approach allowing end-users to document needs in situ. Furthermore, we present first evaluation results to highlight the feasibility of on-site end-user led requirements elicitation

The impact of software development companies on software engineers' responses to incomplete requirements

Cataloged from PDF version of article.It is commonly accepted that software requirements quality affects software product quality, and high-quality software products depend on complete requirements. With incomplete requirements, depending on the requirement software engineers attempt to fi ll gaps differently; either by getting feedback from the user or by making assumptions. Assumptions may be explicit or implicit. Explicit assumptions are preferable to implicit assumptions because explicit assumptions can be validated. We conduct an empirical study to determine whether the number of explicit assumptions made by software engineers is related to the companies that the engineers work for. Using data from eight companies we investigate the responses of 251 software engineers to the same incomplete software requirement. The results of the study show a signifi cant relationship between a software development company and the number of explicit assumptions made by the engineers who work for that compan

REQUIREMENTS ENGINEERING FOR HYBRID PRODUCTS AS BUNDLES OF HARDWARE, SOFTWARE AND SERVICE ELEMENTS – A LITERATURE REVIEW

In this paper we compare different approaches and show the need for systematic requirements engineering for hybrid products beyond disciplinary boundaries. Hybrid products consist of combinations of hardware, software and service elements. The purpose of this paper is to report on a literature review on requirements engineering for hybrid products. Each academic discipline involved (software engineering, product engineering and service engineering) has a different view on requirements engineering. The goal of the literature review is to discover how the approaches of each discipline are able to cope with requirements engineering for hybrid products

Managing employers' requirements in construction industry : experiences and challenges

2009-2010 > Academic research: refereed > Publication in refereed journalAccepted ManuscriptPublishe

A Requirements-Based Analysis of Success in Open- Source Software Development Projects

The literature on open-source requirements is commonly concerned either with the processes associated with theserequirements or with very specific requirements-related aspects of open-source development. In this study we bridge betweenthese two approaches by exploring the existing relationships between open-source requirements and few characteristics ofopen-source projects (software quality and software project success). First we develop a requirements-based taxonomy ofopen-source projects and we discover patterns linking between this taxonomy and project success. We also propose aclassification of requirement types based on their representativeness in open-source projects. This highlights the overallimportance of various types of requirements in the context of open-source software development. We also identify exceptionsdefined as the unusually high frequency of a requirement type and explain them based on the specific domain addressedwithin the project containing the exception. Finally, we investigate the lifecycle of 16 open-source projects and discover andexplain patterns of evolution for a number of requirement types

User Involvement, Procurement Practices and Implementation of Building Construction Projects in the Kenyan Judiciary

Kenyan population increased from 20 million in 1985 to approximately 47.6 million in 2019 and with it, demand for justice also increased yet the growth did not come with improved Judiciary infrastructure. This attracted the World Bank through the Judicial Performance Improvement Project (JPIP) to fund 30 major court construction projects while the Kenyan Government also funded another 33 such projects from 2013. However, by January, 2020,only 10 projects had been completed and successfully handed over with all the 63 projects being out of the planned time and with variation on the original scope of works.This gave rise to this study that aimed to evaluate the influence of user involvement on implementation of building construction projects in the Kenyan judiciary as moderated with the procurement practices. The study was based on general systems theory. Pragmatism paradigm and convergent parallel mixed research design was adopted and proportionate stratified sampling was used to select a population of 234 consisting of judiciary staff, construction staff  and consultants .Primary data was collected through use of questionnaires, interviews and document  content analysis. Reliability was tested using Cronbach’s Alpha while data was analyzed using descriptive statistics which included measures of central tendency. Qualitative data was subjected to thematic analysis to triangulate results derived from quantitative data. Inferential statistics was analyzed by correlation, simple linear regression and multiple regression analysis. Two hypotheses were tested to establish whether there were significant relationships between project delivery attributes and implementation of building construction projects in the Kenyan Judiciary, namely  1.H0:  User Involvement has no significant relationship with implementation of construction projects in the Kenyan Judiciary and 2.H0: There is a significant moderating influence of procurement practices on the relationship between user involvement  and implementation of building construction projects in the Kenyan Judiciary. The findings were that there was a significant influence of user involvement on the implementation of construction projects in the Kenyan Judiciary and that procurement practices significantly moderated the relationship between user involvement and implementation of building construction projects in the Kenyan Judiciary. The slope coefficient was significant when p ≤0.05. The findings of the study will be beneficial to policy makers, project managers in public and private sectors and scholars regarding project delivery attributes on implementation of building construction projects. Keywords: User involvement, Procurement Practices and Implementation of Building Construction Projects. DOI: 10.7176/EJBM/13-18-12 Publication date:September 30th 202

Opportunities for e-brainstorming in pre-design processes of healthcare projects

Opportunities for e-brainstorming in pre-design processes of healthcare project

Feedback Gathering from an Industrial Point of View

Feedback communication channels allow end-users to express their needs, which can be considered in software development and evolution. Although feedback gathering and analysis have been identified as an important topic and several researchers have started their investigation, information is scarce on how software companies currently elicit end-user feedback. In this study, we explore the experiences of software companies with respect to feedback gathering. The results of a case study and online survey indicate two sides of the same coin: on the one hand, most software companies are aware of the relevance of end-user feedback for software evolution and provide feedback channels, which allow end-users to communicate their needs and problems. On the other hand, the quantity and quality of the feedback received varies. We conclude that software companies still do not fully exploit the potential of end-user feedback for software development and evolution