Eliciting Expertise

Since the last edition of this book there have been rapid developments in the use and exploitation of formally elicited knowledge. Previously, (Shadbolt and Burton, 1995) the emphasis was on eliciting knowledge for the purpose of building expert or knowledge-based systems. These systems are computer programs intended to solve real-world problems, achieving the same level of accuracy as human experts. Knowledge engineering is the discipline that has evolved to support the whole process of specifying, developing and deploying knowledge-based systems (Schreiber et al., 2000) This chapter will discuss the problem of knowledge elicitation for knowledge intensive systems in general

Modeling functional requirements using tacit knowledge: a design science research methodology informed approach

The research in this paper adds to the discussion linked to the challenge of capturing and modeling tacit knowledge throughout software development projects. The issue emerged when modeling functional requirements during a project for a client. However, using the design science research methodology at a particular point in the project helped to create an artifact, a functional requirements modeling technique, that resolved the issue with tacit knowledge. Accordingly, this paper includes research based upon the stages of the design science research methodology to design and test the artifact in an observable situation, empirically grounding the research undertaken. An integral component of the design science research methodology, the knowledge base, assimilated structuration and semiotic theories so that other researchers can test the validity of the artifact created. First, structuration theory helped to identify how tacit knowledge is communicated and can be understood when modeling functional requirements for new software. Second, structuration theory prescribed the application of semiotics which facilitated the development of the artifact. Additionally, following the stages of the design science research methodology and associated tasks allows the research to be reproduced in other software development contexts. As a positive outcome, using the functional requirements modeling technique created, specifically for obtaining tacit knowledge on the software development project, indicates that using such knowledge increases the likelihood of deploying software successfully

Requirements Elicitation from BPMN Models

Tarkvarasüsteemi loomiseks on väga oluline mõista, millised on tegelikud vajadused ja nende rahuldamist takistavad piirangud. Nõuete tuvastamise käigus õpitakse tundma ümbritsevat keskkonda ja tehakse kindlaks kasutajate ning teiste osapoolte vajadused. Üheks peamiseks kohaks, kust nõudeid leida, on hetkel kasutatavad süsteemid (protsessid, organisatsioon, keskkond ja kasutatavad infosüsteemid). Kasutusel olevaid protsesse kujutatakse tihti graafiliselt mudelitena ja need mudelid kujutavad endast väga olulist informatsiooniallikat nõuete tuvastamisel. BPMN mudelid on saanud väga populaarseks ja neid kasutatakse tihti süsteemide kirjeldamiseks, kuid vaatamata sellele, et nad on väärtuslikud teadmiste allikad, kasutatakse neid nõuete tuvastamisel siiski harva. Üheks selliseks põhjuseks on asjaolu, et puuduvad konkreetsed ja põhjalikud juhised, mis aitavad süstemaatiliselt mudelist nõudeid tuvastada. Selles töös esitletakse meetodit funktsionaalsete nõuete tuvastamiseks BPMN mudelitest. Meetod läbib süsteemselt kõiki nõude komponente ja annab juhised, kuidas BPMN mudelist komponendi kohta informatsiooni leida ning annab lisaks kogumi küsimusi, mida valdkonna spetsialistidele esitada, et nõue oleks põhjalik, järjepidev, piiritletud ja nõutava detailsusega. Loodud meetodit rakendati ka juhtumiuuringu käigus ja tõestati, et uus meetod on rakendatav ning on struktureeritud lähenemine nõuete tuvastamiseks. Meetod tuvastas rohkem nõudeid kui meetod, mis oli algselt kasutusel juhtumi organisatsiooni poolt ja tuvastatud nõuded olid ka parema kvaliteediga. Meetodi rakendamine võttis märkimisväärselt vähem aega, tuvastamise protsess oli hästi kontrollitav, see võimaldas täpsemalt hinnata tuvastamisele kuluvat aega ja seeläbi on meetodit kasutades lihtsam protsessi planeerida ja ülesandeid delegeerida.When building a software system, it is crucial to understand the actual needs and the interfering constraints that apply in the surrounding environment. Elicitation of requirements is all about learning the environment and discovering the needs of users and other stakeholders. One of the primary sources for requirement elicitation is the system (processes, organization, environment and legacy systems) currently being used. The system is often captured in the form of graphical models, which are an important source of information for requirements elicitation. BPMN models are gaining popularity and are frequently used to model systems. Despite the fact that they are a valuable source of knowledge, they are rarely used as a source for eliciting requirements. One reason for this is the lack of concrete and comprehensive guidelines that would assist a systematic requirements elicitation from such models. This thesis presents a method for eliciting functional requirements from BPMN models. The method covers all components of a requirement and gives guidelines where in the BPMN model the information about the components can be found. It also provides a set of questions to be asked from domain experts to make sure that the requirement specification is complete, consistent, bounded and on the required level of granularity. The method was applied on a case study and it was proved that the method is applicable and provides a structured approach to eliciting requirements. The method elicited more requirements than the method previously used by the case organization, and the elicited requirements were also of better quality. The method took considerably less time to apply, it gave better control over the elicitation process, it was easier to evaluate the needed effort, and it enabled to better plan the process. The structured approach makes it easier to delegate work, and there are less situations where something might be overlooked

Relationship analysis : improving the systems analysis process

A significant aspect of systems analysis involves discovering and representing entities and their inter-relationships. Guidelines exist to identify entities but do not provide a rigorous and comprehensive process to explicitly capture the relationship structure of the problem domain. Whereas, other analysis techniques lightly address the relationship discovery process, Relationship Analysis is the only systematic, domain-independent analysis technique focusing exclusively on a domain\u27s relationship structure. The quality of design artifacts, such as class diagrams, and development time necessary to generate these artifacts can be improved by first representing the complete relationship structure of the problem domain. The Relationship Analysis Model is the first theory-based taxonomy to classify relationships. A rigorous evaluation was conducted, including a formal experiment comparing novice and experienced analysts with and without Relationship Analysis. It was shown that the Relationship Analysis Process based on the model does provide a fuller and richer systems analysis, resulting in improved quality of and reduced time in generating class diagrams. It also was shown that Relationship Analysis enables analysts of varying experience levels to achieve a similar level of quality of class diagrams. Relationship Analysis significantly enhances the systems analyst\u27s effectiveness, especially in the area of relationship discovery and documentation resulting in improved analysis and design artifacts

Exploring Impact of Requirements Engineering on Other IT Project Areas – Case Study

Requirements Engineering (RE) is recognized as one of the most important (yet difficult) areas of software engineering that has a significant impact on other areas of IT projects and their final outcomes. Empirical studies investigating this impact are hard to conduct, mainly due to the great effort required. It is thus difficult for both researchers and industry practitioners to make evidence-based evaluations about how decisions about RE practices translate into requirement quality and influence other project areas. We propose an idea of a lightweight approach utilizing widely-used tools to enable such an evaluation without extensive effort. This is illustrated with a pilot study where the data from six industrial projects from a single organization were analyzed and three metrics regarding the requirement quality, rework effort, and testing were used to demonstrate the impact of different RE techniques. We also discuss the factors that are important for enabling the broader adoption of the proposed approach

Requirements Discovery for a Production Management Software

Due to the expanding Condition Based Maintenance (CBM) business at Wärtsilä Oyj a software tool was needed to ease and secure the maintainability of the installed base, delivery requirements, contract and invoicing information. Another aim with this tool was to achieve a degree of predictability of the CBM services by having information available about forthcoming requests for CBM systems and services. As a result, a tool with up-to-date information would serve many stakeholders with all available CBM related information but also remarkably reduce the work load needed to maintain this information manually. The objective of this thesis was to gather and document the requirements. For the requirements discovery a use case based requirements elicitation technique was selected. It was selected because use cases can be documented in a structured way and also because they are a good tool to communicate the behavioural functions of a system between users and software developers. Requirements were also discovered by studying documents, tools, and process, but also by arranging interviews and having discussions with the stakeholders. All the requirements were documented in a Software Requirements Specification using a template from IEEE Std 830-1998. The result of this thesis is a Software Requirements Specification that defines the requirements for this new tool. It was observed that even though it takes only a few minutes to learn read use cases, learning to write good use cases requires much more effort. In addition, the use cases are an important input when making the functional design specification, but they also serve as a base for designing the test cases that the new software will have to meet. Finally, the most important lesson learned was the importance of specifying software requirements that cannot be ignored.fi=Opinnäytetyö kokotekstinä PDF-muodossa.|en=Thesis fulltext in PDF format.|sv=Lärdomsprov tillgängligt som fulltext i PDF-format

Aspect-oriented domain analysis

Dissertação de Mestrado em Engenharia InformáticaDomain analysis (DA) consists of analyzing properties, concepts and solutions for a given domain of application. Based on that information, decisions are made concerning the software development for future application within that domain. In DA, feature modeling is used to describe common and variable requirements for software systems. Nevertheless, they show a limited view of the domain. In the mean time, requirement approaches can be integrated to specify the domain requirements. Among them, we have viewpoint oriented approaches that stand out by their simplicity, and efficiency organizing requirements. However, none of them deals with modularization of crosscutting subjects. A crosscutting subject can be spread out in several requirement documents. In this work we will use a viewpoint oriented approach to describe the domain requirements extended with aspects. Aspect-oriented domain analysis (AODA) is a growing area of interest as it addresses the problem of specifying crosscutting properties at the domain analysis level. The goal of this area is to obtain a better reuse at this abstraction level through the advantages of aspect orientation. The aim of this work is to propose an approach that extends domain analysis with aspects also using feature modeling and viewpoint