A template for requirement elicitation of dependable product lines

Abstract

Engineering software quickly and at a low cost, while preserving quality, is a well-known objective that has not been reached. Reducing the development time can be achieved by reusing software components, as proposed in the software product line development approach. Dependability may be one of the most important attributes concerning quality, due to negative consequences (health, cost, time, etc.) induced by non-dependable software. Our proposal, presented in this article, is to offer a means to elicit the requirements of a product line, such that the dependability attribute would be explicitly considered, and such that reuse would be achieved by differentiating commonalities and variabilities between products. The proposed semi-formal template includes product commonality and variability elicitation, as well as elicitation of normal, misuse and recovery scenarios. Furthermore, we allow the elicitation of the advanced transactional nature of scenarios, since it provides us with a way to elicit fault tolerance requirements, which is our targeted means to achieving dependability. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2007.