Context. Compare with bespoke RE, market-driven requirements engineering (MDRE), has manyclassical requirements engineering activities of bespoke RE. Elicitation is one of these activities. Thisprocess is to capture, extract and obtain needs from stakeholders. And there are many techniques toguide MDRE elicitation, and some techniques for bespoke RE are also used in MDRE contextnowadays. However, not all of these techniques are suitable for MDRE due to the difference betweenMDRE and bespoke RE, for example, in MDRE context, there is no specific customers’ participation.Meanwhile, there is a lack of studies that compare elicitation techniques by evaluating theircompetence of mitigating MDRE challenges. Objectives. In this study, we investigate and collect techniques which can be used for MDREelicitation. We also identify challenges of MDRE elicitation practice from literature as evaluatingcriteria. Then, we evaluate elicitation techniques’ competence of mitigating these challenges. Finally,we discuss with some interviewees to validate our result with real-world MDRE context. Methods. We use literature review and snowball sampling to investigate and collect MDRE elicitationtechniques and challenges. Next, we summarize elicitation techniques’ advantages and limitationsfrom literature and compare these techniques by evaluating whether they can mitigate MDREchallenges we find. Next, we conduct interview with 8 interviewees who are practitioners or havedeveloping experience in order to find out and discuss the difference between academic and realworldMDRE. Results. We identify 6 elicitation techniques which can be used in MDRE to compare. We also collect6 challenges which may happen in MDRE elicitation process. We compare them by literature studyand interview with practitioners and find that although some interviewees’ opinions are similar withliterature, there are still many different cases we need to consider before choosing elicitationtechniques. Conclusions. In this research, we fill the gap that there is a lack of studies about the comparison ofelicitation techniques in MDRE context. We also find 4 factors which should be studied in-depth inthe future MDRE elicitation techniques research, and validate our result with practice and discuss thereason of differences. Our result can help requirements engineers to choose suitable elicitationtechniques in MDRE projects.

Context. Software products are usually developed for either a specific customer (bespoke) or a broader market (market-driven). Due to their characteristics, bespoke and market-driven development face different problems, especially in the requirements engineering areas. Moreover, many of these problems are caused by an inadequate requirements engineering process. Hence, in order to improve the process and subsequently the software quality, the maturity of the RE process must be evaluated. Although there are many process assessment initiatives done in bespoke development, there is a need for models covering both approaches. Uni-REPM, which can assess the RE process maturity in all environments, is such a model. Objectives. This study presents an academic and industrial evaluation of the Uni-REPM model before transferring it to industry. Methods. The first validation was conducted in the form of interviews with seven academic experts in which the model was scrutinized for its correctness and completeness. Subsequently, the model and the assessment method were applied and validated in 4 industrial organizations locating in Denmark, Spain and Singapore. Results. Based on the feedback obtained in the validation, refinements were made to the model to improve its quality. In addition, the evaluation result analysis of each industrial project is useful in indentifying weak areas in the process and suggesting possible improvement practices. Conclusions. The study shows that Uni-REPM is a quick, simple and cost-effective solution to assess the maturity level of the Requirements Engineering process of projects. Moreover, the assessment method using checklist is highly usable and applicable in various international development environments.

The area of Requirements Engineering is often underestimated in value in the area of Software Engineering. According to certain sources the failure rate of IT investments is over 60%. In addition problems introduced through the Requirements Engineering of a project accounts for something like 50% of the total debugging costs. The main reason for this is a low level of maturity pertaining to the Requirements Engineering process. This thesis introduces a model that can help organizations improve their Requirements Engineering process. A first step in process improvement is process evaluation. The REPM model has the purpose of measuring the maturity level of the Requirements Engineering process in projects, and to give a basis for what steps to take in order to improve on it. In addition to the model a method for using the model is introduced. The model and method are subsequently designed, implemented and validated. The validation takes the form of interviews and case-studies in industry featuring four companies and four projects of varying size. The project evaluations were conducted on-site in both Sweden and in Ireland. It is shown that the REPM model in combination with the method is a good way to evaluate the Requirement Engineering process of a project. It gives a picture of the current state of the Requirements Engineering process in a project and, more importantly, how the results of the evaluation can be used for process improvement. / Kravhantering är ett ofta underskattat område inom programvaruteknik. Det här arbetet beskriver och testar en metod för att utvärdera mognadsgraden för kravhanteringen i mjukvaruprojekt. Det presenteras en modell att utvärdera mot, en metod för att utföra utvärderingen, och ett sätt att presentera resultaten från en utvärdering på ett sådant sätt att det lätt gå att se vad man kan göra för att förbättra kravhanteringsprocessen och få en enhetlig nivå på alla delmoment inom kravhantering.

Examensarbetets problemområde återfinns i den tidiga delen inom informationssystemutveckling. Denna utvecklingsfas, kallad Requirements Engineering (RE), innefattar aktiviteter för att förstå, dokumentera och validera de behov och krav som föreligger för ett framtida informationssystem. RE är en avgörande aktivitet i processen att utveckla ett informationssystem som tillfredsställer användare och kunders förväntningar och behov. De olika intressenterna som är involverade i RE-processen har olika roller, bakgrund och kunskaper. Av denna anledning föreligger olika problem och möjligheter med avseende på intressenterna. I examensarbetet utreds vilka dessa möjligheter och problem kan vara. För att besvara frågeställningen har en mindre litteraturstudie och fem intervjuer med analytiker genomförts. Intressentprofiler har tagits fram där respektive intressenttyps roll och bidrag framgår och för dessa har även svårigheter och problem som kan uppstå i RE-processen identifierats. För att ge en tydlig bild över identifierade möjligheter och problem samt redovisa interaktionen mellan intressenterna har även sammanfattande figurer över detta skapats.

I dagens samhälle spelar informationssystem en viktig roll i de flesta företag och organisationer. Informationssystemets uppgift är att tillgodose och hjälpa användarna med information och informationshantering samt att leda till en effektivisering. Arbetet med att utveckla databaserade informationssystem är problematiskt och systemutvecklingsprojekt överstiger ofta budget både vad gäller tid och pengar. Återkommande problem är att systemen inte gör vad användaren vill samt att systemen inte utnyttjas till full kapacitet. Svårigheten med kravhanteringen är något som anses vara en orsak till misslyckandena. Den viktigaste informationskällan för systemutvecklarna då det gäller att ta reda på systemkraven är användarna. Då användarna spelar en viktig roll i kravhanteringen, vilken i sin tur spelar en viktig roll i systemutvecklingsprocessen, är detta ett intressant problemområde. Denna rapports fokus ligger på hur användarna ser på kravhanteringsprocessen. Syftet med rapporten är att ur ett användarperspektiv utvärdera användarmedverkan i systemutvecklingsprocessens samt att försöka finna om det finns ett samband mellan användares erfarenheter ifrån systemutvecklingsprocessen och deras åsikter kring det färdiga systemet.

Utvecklingen av informationssystem utförs vanligen med hjälp av en systemutvecklingsmodell där kravhanteringsaktivitetens (Requirements Engineering – RE-processen) syfte är att samla in och bearbeta kundens alla krav på systemet. Den slutliga produkten av RE-processen är en kravspecifikation där alla kraven gällande exempelvis systemets funktionalitet, syfte etc skall specificeras. Det är inte alltid självklart vilken information som en kravspecifikation bör innehålla då detta dokument kan för både kunden och leverantören ses som ett kvitto på vad som skall utvecklas och hur det skall gå till. Dokumentet skall nämligen fungera som ett underlag för de så kallade implementations- och designaktiviteterna i systemutvecklingsarbetet samt fungera som ett underlag för diskussion och kontrakt mellan leverantör och kund gällande utvecklingen av informationssystemet. Kravspecifikationen bör därför innehålla komplett och förståelig information så att detta dokument uppfyller sina syften. Därmed är det inte enkelt att veta vilken information som en kravspecifikation bör innehålla för att detta dokument skall uppfylla ovannämnda egenskaper. Då kravspecifikationen skall upprättas kan ett ramverk eller en standard tillämpas som förespråkar att viss information skall ingå. Det ramverk som är upprättat i detta examensarbete innehåller den information som jag anser bör ingå i en kravspecifikation. Utifrån detta ramverk finns det viss information som jag anser att en kravspecifikation bör innehålla just ur kontraktsynpunkt. Denna information är följande: · Informationssystemets funktioner · Informationssystemets funktionella egenskaper · Informationssystemets generella egenskaper · Utbildning · Dokumentation · Leveransdatum

Whilst numerous studies have retrospectively reported the impact of negative user emotions, motivational problems or value clashes during software developments, few Requirements Engineering (RE) studies have considered the elicitation of users’ values, motivations or emotions (VM&Es) and there is little advice for practising analysts as to how to deal with these factors. This thesis explores the impact of users’ VM&Es within RE work. The starting point was a review of the current state of analyst practice. A literature survey considered the RE guidance available to analysts on the elicitation and understanding of ‘soft issues’ such as VM&Es. In parallel, a series of interviews with 12 industry analysts sought their views on the relevance of users’ VM&Es, the impact on requirements work, and approaches to identifying such information. This study identified behaviours adopted by experienced analysts that would be useful to promote to novice analysts, and documented the analysts’ own requirements for a method to support them in eliciting VM&Es. These findings informed the design of the Value Based Requirements Engineering (VBRE) method and website (www.vbre.org.uk), intended to support requirements analysts in identifying and considering the impact of such ‘soft factors’. Research into RE method adoption highlights the importance of industry input, so a Participatory Design (PD) approach was taken in developing VBRE, iteratively evaluating and refining the method with input from practising analysts. A series of complementary evaluations of the method are presented. An experimental study investigated the method’s utility and usability with computer science undergraduate students, whilst a set of four case studies explored adoption of the VBRE method with industry analysts. The analysts used the method during their RE work, adapting the approach according to their circumstances and levels of experience. The participants credited the method with a positive impact on their RE work and the novice analysts reported feeling more confident of their abilities to handle ‘soft issues’. The key contributions of this work are:1. An exploration of the views of practising analysts as to the relevance and impact of VM&Es within their RE work.2. Development of an analysis method and support materials to aid analysts in identifying users’ VM&Es.3. A demonstration of the utility of adopting a PD approach to the development of RE methods.4. An evaluation of the use of the method in industry, exploring the use of case studies to understand how novice and expert analysts adopt and adapt the VBRE approach. This thesis is unusual in taking a PD approach to developing a solution for a RE problem: that analysts need to understand users’ VM&Es and their impact on software projects. The VBRE method attempts to address this gap, and the positive reception given by the analysts involved in evaluation of the method indicates they see utility in the approach. Future work will focus on continuing to collaborate with industry analysts to understand their use of the VBRE method, identifying improvements to the method and website, and gathering examples of the method’s impact.

In recent years, the number of regulations an organization needs to comply with has been increasing, and organizations have to ensure that their business processes are aligned with these regulations. However, because of the complexity and intended vagueness of regulations in general, it is not possible to treat them the same way as other types of requirements. On the other hand, the cost of being non-compliant can also be fairly high; non-compliance can cause crucial harm to the organization with financial penalties or loss of reputation. Therefore, it is very important for organizations to take a systematic approach to ensuring that their compliance with related laws, regulations and standards is established and maintained. To achieve this goal, this thesis proposes a model-based compliance analysis framework for business processes called Legal-URN. This framework is composed of four layers of abstraction linked to each other. The framework exploits the User Requirements Notation (URN) as the modeling language to describe and combine legal and organizational models. In order to model legal documents, legal statements are first classified into four classes of Hohfeldian rights, and then Hohfeldian models of the regulations and their statements are created. These models are further refined into legal goal and business process models via a domain-specific version of URN called Legal URN profile. To check the well-formedness of the models and to identify instances of non-compliance, 23 Object Constraint Language (OCL) rules are provided. In this thesis, the quantitative and qualitative analysis algorithms of URN's Goal-oriented Requirement Language are extended to help analyze quantitatively and qualitatively the degree of compliance of an organization to the legal models. Furthermore, with the help of a prioritization algorithm, the framework enables one to decide, while taking the organization goals into consideration, which non-compliant instances to address first in order to provide a suitable evolution path for business processes. In addition, to assess compliance with more than one regulation, a pair-wise comparison algorithm enables organizations to identify the similarities and conflicts among regulations and incorporate them in the models. The jUCMNav tool, an Eclipse plug-in for URN modeling and analysis, was extended to support the framework and its algorithms and rules. The thesis contributions are evaluated through a gap analysis based on a systematic literature review, a comparison with closely related work, and two case studies in the healthcare domain: one with a single regulation and realistic business processes, and a second with three additional regulations. We also identify the benefits and limitations of the framework, as well as potential extensions for future work. The Legal-URN framework provides a tool-supported, rigorous approach to compliance analysis of organizations against relevant regulations.

Current Requirements Engineering (RE) mechanisms used to measure Requirements Volatility (RV) employ textual-based artifacts for tracking changes to software requirements that primarily consist of detailed requirements documents that are difficult to understand by most software system stakeholders making it almost impossible for these stakeholders to gain a clear picture of how changes to a requirement will impact the total system overall. Research in the area of RE visualizations have proven that graphically representing software information in the form of visualizations can communicate complex information regarding requirements to system stakeholders in a manner that does not require an in-depth knowledge of RE technical documentation. This research used the concepts of Footprint Visualizations (FVs) to graphically represent software requirements as they evolved over time and analyzed these FV image artifacts to determine RV ratings. This work successfully demonstrated the use of FV analysis to measure RV. This work performed a qualitative study that compared the relationship between the RV ratings that were determined using the FV-based analysis methods proposed in this work to the RV ratings determined using traditional non-visual RV methods that relied on subject matter expert evaluation of a common requirements use case data set. The results of this study expanded the body of knowledge in the field of Requirements Engineering Visualization by demonstrating new analysis methods for measuring volatility in requirements use cases as they evolve over the software development life cycle process in order to aid system stakeholders in understanding the effects of changes made to requirements regardless of the individual stakeholders level of technical requirements documentation training.

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