****************REQUIREMENTS ENGINEERING NEWSLETTER******************** No. 39. Contents 1. Message from the Moderator! (Anthony Finkelstein) 2. CFP: ASE - Special issue on Process Technology (Elisabetta Di Nitto) 3. CFP: Doctoral Consortium for RE '97 (Myla Archer) 4. CFP: 4th Intl Conf on Software Processes (Wolfgang Emmerich) 5. WEB: Requirements Engineering Workshop Results (Philip Morris) 6. WEB: Euromethod Document Distribution Centre (Miren U. Libano) 7. WEB: RESG and Requirenautics Quarterly (Steve Easterbrook) 8. WEB: TWORARE project (Patrick Heymans) 9. WEB: CLYDER Requirements Engineering Method (Jacques Hagelstein) 10. BOOK: Requirements Engineering (Roel J Wieringa) 11. BOOK: Process-Centered Software Engineering Environments (Pankaj K Garg) 12. BOOK: Concurrent Engineering Fundamentals (Biren Prasad) 13. EVENT: 3rd Intl Symp on Requirements Engineering (Ralph D. Jeffords) 14. EVENT: Making Requirements Measurable - A Workshop (Olly Gotel) 15. PAPER: Use Case Modelling (Bjorn Regnell) 16. PAPERS: NATURE reports (Ralf Doemges) 17. THESIS: Tool Construction for PSDEs based on Object Databases (W Emmerich) 18. THESIS: Contribution Structures for Requirements Traceability (Olly Gotel) 19. PROCEEDINGS: REFSQ '95 (Klaus Pohl) 20. INFORMATION: QFD Mailing List (Bill Bolton) 21. JOB: an interesting job opportunity... (Anthony Finkelstein) ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | If you have questions about particular items appearing in the newsletter - | | send them to the originators. If you wish to contribute send your material | | to the moderator at: requirements@cs.city.ac.uk | | | | Subscription (or removal) requests should be sent to: | | requirements-request@cs.city.ac.uk Just send an email message containing: | | | | subscribe
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| | | | The Requirements Engineering Newsletter and its archive is also accessible | | through WWW. The URL is: | | | | http://web.cs.city.ac.uk/homes/acwf/rehome.html | | | | You may wish to link any Internet software engineering information resource | | you maintain to this and/or notify the manager of your local Web server by | | passing this message on to them. If you wish your requirements or software | | engineering pages to be linked to the RE Newsletter page please inform me. | | | | You can access the archive via anonymous ftp: | | | | Ftp-host : ftp.cs.city.ac.uk (IP number: 138.40.91.9) | | Directory : pub/requirements | | Files are called renl1, renl2, etc. | | | | Requirements Engineering Newsletter is published solely as an educational | | service. Copyright (c) 1995, Anthony Finkelstein; All Rights Reserved. | | | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ********************************************************************** [1] From: acwf@cs.city.ac.uk (Anthony Finkelstein) Subject: Message from the Moderator! Well, you may be wondering why it has been such a long time since the last newsletter. I have had enquiries asking if either I or the newsletter were dead. I could give you the usual litany of excuses but I doubt if you would be interested. Suffice it to say (after a short intermission caused by my move) I now have a real team and the resources to produce this newsletter on a regular basis. Regards to all ... Anthony ********************************************************************** [2] From: dinitto@ipmel2.elet.polimi.it (Elisabetta Di Nitto) Subject: CFP: ASE - Special issue on Process Technology Automated Software Engineering: An International Journal Special issue on Process Technology Guest editors: Elisabetta Di Nitto and Alfonso Fuggetta Call for Papers Important dates Deadline for submission: 1 May 1996 Publication date (tentative): March 97 Most modern business activities are carried out by a combination of computerized tools and human agents. Typical examples are software (and other) engineering activities, office procedures, and banking systems. All these activities are characterized by the interaction among people and between people and computerized tools. This interaction defines a process, whose effectiveness is essential to ensure the quality of the delivered products and/or services. These business activities share some distinctive features: - Extensive use of automated systems to support and enable the work of human agents. - strong level of dependency among activities. - Communication among human agents. - High degree of evolution of the procedures to be executed. - Presence of significant exceptions and deviations. Information Technology has focused on supporting these activities, generating different research areas that can be collectively called Process Technology. In particular, three important research areas (CSCW, WFMS, and PSEE) are addressing this topic, with different viewpoints and approaches. CSCW (Computer Supported Cooperative Work) research is focusing on how to improve cooperation among multiple human agents, possibly distributed in different places. In this area the focus is mainly on the interaction metaphors used by the human agents, on the management of different kinds of information, and on the definition and support of flexible, application-specific cooperation policies. WFMS (WorkFlow Management System) and PSEE (Process-centered Software Engineering Environment) research is mainly focused on the explicit description of the process to be followed in office procedure and sofware development, respectively. This explicit description can be used to facilitate understanding, communication, and, whenever possible, automation of the process. Even if they share many basic ideas, these two classes of technology have been developed in different application domains. In particular, WFMSs support office automation and information systems, and are mainly focused on controlling the flow and manipulation of documents through different activities. PSEEs are devoted to supporting software developement activities. This is accomplished by managing and storing process artifacts, by controlling software development tools, and by guiding the software engineers involved in the development process. These research areas have originated a wide range of prototypes and even products. However, there are still several issues that need to be addressed, such as management of exceptions and deviations from the codified process model, integration of different cooperation strategies and mechanisms, integration of existing tools (e.g., CASE tools in PSEEs) with process technology, and development of process and product metrics to evaluate the effectiveness of these environments and of the supported process. This special issue focuses on methods and techniques to elicit, assess, describe, and support processes. The goal is twofold: - To provide a forum for presenting innovative solutions to specific issues related with process technology. - To facilitate and stimulate the comparison of approaches developed in different domains to address similar problems. As a consequence, the scope of the special issue is to provide the means to merge and compare different experiences and technologies, in order to provide a unifying view in which all these results can be assessed and reconciled. This is essential to exploit synergies among different technologies and to further promote the development of the field. Submissions: Five copies of the paper should be sent to: Alfonso Fuggetta Politecnico di Milano Dipartimento di Elettronica ed Informazione P.za Leonardo da Vinci, 32 20133 Milano (Italy) Alternatively, a postscript file can be sent to fuggetta@elet.polimi.it. Papers must not exceed 15,000 words. --- Automated Software Engineering Journal - Editors-in-Chief W. Lewis Johnson University of Southern California Information Science Institute 4676 Admiralty Way, Marina del Rey, CA 90292, USA Tel:(310) 822-1511, Fax: (310) 823-6714 Email: johnson@isi.edu Bashar Nuseibeh Imperial College Department of Computing 180 Queen's Gate, London SW7 2BZ, UK Tel: (+44) 171-594-8286, Fax : (+44) 171-581-8024 Email: ban@doc.ic.ac.uk For full "Instruction for Authors" or any other queries, please contact one of the editors-in-chief, or see the journal's Web page (http://www-dse.doc.ic.ac.uk/~ban/ase.html). ********************************************************************** [3] From: archer@itd.nrl.navy.mil (Myla Archer) Subject: CFP: Doctoral Consortium for RE '97 Doctoral Consortium for RE '97 Doctoral students in the area of Requirements Engineering are invited to submit an abstract of their dissertation research to the Doctoral Consortium to be held in conjunction with Third International Symposium on Requirements Engineering (RE'97). The doctoral consortium will meet on Sunday, January 5, 1997. Special dates include: Deadline for submission of abstracts: September 15, 1996 Notification of acceptance: November 1, 1996 The consortium panel will include: M. Archer, Naval Research Laboratory, USA R. Bharadwaj, Naval Research Laboratory, USA S. Easterbrook, NASA/West Virginia University, USA A. Finkelstein, City University, UK J. Gannon, University of Maryland, USA J. Kirby, Naval Research Laboratory, USA J. C. Leite, PUC-Rio, Brazil K. Ryan, University of Limerick, Ireland D. Till, City University, UK Students whose abstracts are accepted for presentation will present their work to the panel and other students, and then have private individual consultations with one or more experts from the panel, not to include the student's research supervisor. Student abstracts may be as much as 5000 words in length, but brevity is strongly encouraged. Abstracts should conform to the following outline: * A statement of the problem being studied. * A brief background sketch describing the context and importance of the problem. * The proposed approach to a solution. * A description of the original contributions that will result from the research. * A brief overview of progress made. Acceptance for presentation in the Doctoral Consortium will be based on a mixture of merit of the undertaking, interest of the work to others (students, in particular), and whether comments from disinterested experts could be of particular benefit to the student. To submit your abstract for consideration, send four copies to the Doctoral Consortium Chair. Electronic submissions in PostScript form are acceptable from locations outside the USA. Abstracts should be accompanied by the following information: * Full contact information, including e-mail and physical addresses, phone and fax numbers. * The name and affiliation of the student's research supervisor. Students attending the Consortium are expected to register for RE '97 (at the reduced student fee). Additional information about RE '97 may be found at our web site at http://www.itd.nrl.navy.mil/conf/RE97. Myla Archer, Doctoral Consortium Chair, RE'97 US Naval Research Laboratory, Code 5546 Washington, D.C., 20375-5337 Email: archer@itd.nrl.navy.mil Phone: (202)404-6304 Fax: (202)404-7942 ********************************************************************** [4] From: emmerich@barney.soi.city.ac.uk (Wolfgang Emmerich) Subject: CFP: 4th Intl Conf on Software Processes ICSP4 - 4th INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON SOFTWARE PROCESSES SOFTWARE PROCESS - Improvement and Practice December 2-6, Metropole Hotel, Brighton CALL FOR PAPERS Background: ---------- Program Chair: Wilhelm Schaefer, University of Paderborn, Germany sponsored by the International Software Process Association Following on the themes of ICSP 1 (Manufacturing Complex Systems), ICSP 2 (Continuous Software Process Improvement), and ICSP 3 (Applying Software Process), ICSP 4 will particularly address improvement of software processes in practice. This theme includes the improvement of the underlying technology like description formalisms or measurement paradigms, but also the improvement of the development process itself including, for example, evolution of processes and process models or the results of process assessment studies. The Software Process Landmark 96 - Software Process 96 ------------------------------------------------------ Originally planned to be held in Brussels, ICSP 4 will now take place in Brighton (just 30 min away from London) and will be colocated with three other software-process related events. This supports an exciting exchange of ideas, concepts and projects with highly practitioner-focussed approaches. As planned, ICSP 4 is thus cooperating closely with the European Union's ESSI (European Software and Systems Initiative) program which sponsored a number of those practitioner-focussed projects. ICSP 4 will bring together researchers and practitioners in an exciting new setting. Topics ------ Papers are solicited on the following topics, including but not limited to: * process description formalisms * empirical and assessment studies * process models and programs * process evolution * measurement and experiment paradigms * software and non-software processes relationships This conference will continue the tradition of a single track of sessions addressing software process related topics. These sessions will include refereed papers, invited presentations and panel discussions. Submission Guidelines --------------------- Full papers include original research, description, evaluation and survey papers. Research and process description papers should indicate clearly what is novel (and why) and discuss related work. Evaluation and Survey papers should provide fundamental insights in the areas addressed. These papers should be limited to 6000 words. Short papers include experience reports on the effectiveness of existing and novel processes, the results of process improvements, and the use of process descriptions. These papers should be limited to 2000 words. Panel proposals should describe the topic to be addressed and identify prospective panelists. In all cases, empirical data in support of a paper`s theses will be considered a significant asset. Papers should not have been published or concurrently submitted for publication. It is planned to publish the proceedings once again with the IEEE. Contact Point ------------- 6 copies of all papers and proposals should be submitted by 1 May 1996 together with the full postal address, telephone and email address (if available) to Wilhelm Schaefer Fachbereich 17 - Praktische Informatik, Universitdt Paderborn, D- 33095 Paderborn wilhelm@uni-paderborn.de PC-Members: V. Ambriola (I), S. Bandinelli (ESP), N. Barghouti (USA), J. Brodman (USA), J.C. Derniame (F), W. Emmerich (UK), G. Engels (NL), V. Gruhn (D), K. Inoue (JPN), T. Katayama (JPN), N.H. Madhavji (CND), C. Marlin (AUS), R. Messnarz (IRL), L. Osterweil (USA), D. Perry (USA), C. Tully (UK) Further Information ------------------- If you want to receive further information about the Software Process 96 event (the 4 conferences joining forces) and want to ensure that the congress folder will be sent to you please send a short note to the congress secretariat: Meetings Management, 100716.3246@compuserve.com. ********************************************************************** [5] From: Philip.Morris@jrc.it (Philip Morris) Subject: WEB: Requirements Engineering Workshop Results In October 1995 the Joint Research Centre of the EC in Italy held, on behalf of DGIII, an Industrially driven workshop on Requirements Engineering. The purpose of the workshop was to scope possible guidelines for future Requirements Engineering research by specifying industrial needs. The results of the workshop indicate criteria for both directing and assessing the industrial relevance of future RE RTD and Technology Transfer proposals. The results from the workshop are now available on the World Wide Web: http://sai.jrc.it/people/stefan/sics/report.htm ********************************************************************** [6] From: libano@esi.es (Miren U. Libano) Subject: WEB: Euromethod Document Distribution Centre (EDDC) The EDDC is now public at our server site: http://www.esi.es/Euromethod ********************************************************************** [7] From: steve@atlantis.ivv.nasa.gov (Steve Easterbrook) Subject: WEB: RESG and Requirenautics Quarterly Requirenautics Quarterly, the newsletter of the Requirements Engineering Specialist Group (RESG) of the British Computer Society, is now available on the web. The Web version does not include the main articles from the newsletter (you have to join RESG to receive those!), but does include a calendar of events, and a requirements engineering resources listing. It also contains links to web pages describing relevant conferences and calls for papers. The web page for Issue 4 (October 1995) can be found at: http://research.ivv.nasa.gov/~steve/resg/rq4/index.html The BCS RESG home page can be found at: http://www.OiT.co.uk/resg/ ********************************************************************** [8] From: phe@info.fundp.ac.be (Patrick Heymans) Subject: WEB: TWORARE project WWW Pages are now available for the Esprit 4 Trial Application TWORARE project. The main objective of the 2RARE project (`2 Real Applications for Requirements Engineering') is to deal with the changing requirements of two large and complex distributed applications. To this end, the project uses a new generation of Requirements Engineering (RE) formal techniques with the objective of providing a rigorous specification of the requirements expressed by customers and of the system's analysis resulting from these requirements. Moreover, requirements traceability techniques are applied in order to integrate and maintain the different kinds of descriptions captured during the RE activity. The URL is http://www.info.fundp.ac.be/~phe/2rare.html ********************************************************************** [9] From: jacques.hagelstein@sema.be (Jacques Hagelstein) Subject: WEB: CLYDER Requirements Engineering Method The CLYDER requirements engineering method has been developed as part of the Icarus ESPRIT project (1990-95). Clyder is an object-oriented method with a formal semantics, and is described in the following paper : J. Hagelstein, D. Roelants and P. Wodon, "Formal Requirements Made Practical," 4th European Software Engineering Conference (ESEC 93), Lecture Notes in Computer Science 717, Springer-Verlag, 1993, pp. 127-144. The aim of CLYDER is to be rigorous while remaining simple to use. Some of its characteristics are listed below : - few notations - only a graphical and a textual one, - native object-orientedness - CLYDER is not an evolution of earlier methods, - ability to range from informal but structured specifications to fully formal ones, - requirements presented piecewise, to support various viewpoints over them, - availability of a formal semantics, which guarantees the soundness of the language and allows the automatic performance of sophisticated semantic checks. We developed a tool on PC/Windows. A demo version (fully functional, but cannot handle large specifications) is now freely available at the following place : http://osiris.sunderland.ac.uk/sst/case/clyder20.zip We also developed a Unix version, but it can only run as part of the Concerto software engineering environment marketed by Sema Group. Any feedback or question is welcome at "clyder@sema.be". ********************************************************************** [10] From: roelw@cs.vu.nl (Roel J Wieringa) Subject: BOOK: Requirements Engineering Requirements Engineering: Frameworks for Understanding. R.J. Wieringa Wiley 1996. ISBN 0 471 95884 0 (softcover) In February, the book ``Requirements Engineering: Frameworks for Understanding'' by R.J. Wieringa was published. It gives a framework for requirements engineering based upon frameworks for industrial product development and analyzes Change Analysis, Information Strategy Planning, Entity-Relationship Modeling, Structured Analysis and Jackson System Development within this framework. Each method is first presented in its own terms, giving sufficient detail to be able to use the method. Next, each method is analyzed within the framework and compared with other methods. The analysis makes clear which elements of these methods can be combined and which are incompatible. A proposal for an integrated method is given. The book ends with a discussion of development strategies, relating them to the requirements engineering framework. The heuristics given by the spiral method and by Euromethod to choose among these strategies are discussed. The book contains exercises, extensive bibliographical discussions, two case studies and an index. A detailed table of contents available from: roelw@cs.vu.nl ********************************************************************** [11] From: garg@hplpkg.hpl.hp.com (Pankaj K Garg) Subject: BOOK: Process-Centered Software Engineering Environments Process-Centered Software Engineering Environments IEEE Computer Society Press, Los Alamitos, Calif., 1996. ISBN 0-8186-7103-3 (with a foreword by Watts Humphrey) >From the Preface: "This book presents the state of the art in the area of process-centered software engineering environments (PSEEs). PSEEs represent a new generation of software engineering environments in which the processes used to produce and maintain software products are explicitly modeled in the environment. They hold the exciting promise of enabling a significant increase in both software productivity and quality. The papers in this collection present a comprehensive picture of this emerging area, highlighting the key concepts and issues. For the researcher, the issues represent challenges to be conquered and directions to pursue. For the practitioner, the issues represent benefits that may be gained by the application of PSEEs in the work environment." ********************************************************************** [12] From: bprasad@cmsa.gmr.com (Biren Prasad) Subject: BOOK: Concurrent Engineering Fundamentals Concurrent Engineering Fundamentals: Integrated Product and Process Organization Biren Prasad Prentice Hall, Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458 Volume I: 1996, 502 pp., ISBN # 0-13-147463-4 (Just Published) Volume 2: 1996, 500 pp., ISBN # 0-13-396496-0 (Due Spring 1996) The critically important elements of product and process organization comprise identifying and evaluating product development practices, eliminating wastes and rework, decomposing tasks, adding product values, and integrating the product, process and organization (PPO) into a taxonomic system of product realization. Concurrent Engineering Fundamentals gives an integrated view of this organization, covering management's organizational and cultural concerns, as well as the methodological fields of taxonomy, including philosophical, conceptual and virtual perspectives. If you would like to get a copy of the Table of Contents, the CE Fundamentals textbook, or to discuss technical details concerning Concurrent Engineering, please direct your inquiries or Email your request to bprasad@cmsa.gmr.com or visit Prentice Hall's web site: http://www.prenhall.com ********************************************************************** [13] From: jeffords@itd.nrl.navy.mil (Ralph D. Jeffords) Subject: EVENT: 3rd Intl Symp on Requirements Engineering CALL FOR PARTICIPATION Third IEEE International Symposium on Requirements Engineering (RE'97) 5-8 January, 1997 Annapolis MD, USA Sponsored by the IEEE Computer Society (pending) In cooperation with ACM SIGSOFT (pending) and IFIP Working Group 2.9 (Software Requirements Engineering) OVERVIEW Requirements engineering is the branch of software engineering concerned with the real-world goals for, functions of, and constraints on software systems. It is also concerned with the relationship of these factors to precise specifications of software behavior, and to their evolution over time and across software families. This symposium, to be held in Annapolis, Maryland (located near the Washington D.C. metropolis) will bring together researchers and practitioners of requirements engineering for an exchange of ideas and experience. The program will consist of invited talks, paper presentations, panels, tutorials, working groups, demonstrations, and a doctoral consortium. In addition to the paper track, the program will include, for the first time in the RE symposia series, a parallel industrial track for developers, managers interested in products with potential near-term payoff, also researchers interested in industry-relevant problems or requirements technology. The industrial track will include invited talks and presentations on industrial experiences and upcoming commercial tools. Papers describing original research in any area of requirements engineering are invited for submission. Symposium organizers extend a special invitation for paper submission and participation to researchers and practitioners working in areas that have been under-represented in past symposia, including high assurance, safety- or mission-critical systems and formal approaches to requirements engineering. This call for participation is also available by anonymous ftp from ftp.cs.toronto.edu ( /dist/ISRE97/CFP ) or see the WWW page at http://www.itd.nrl.navy.mil/conf/ISRE97. INFORMATION FOR AUTHORS Papers on all aspects of requirements engineering are welcome. However, all submitted papers must be classified according to the problems they are addressing and the contributions they are making toward solving them. The official classification scheme for the symposium can be obtained by requesting it from the Program Chair or by anonymous FTP from host ftp.cs.toronto.edu (/dist/ISRE97/CFP). Papers will be evaluated according to criteria appropriate for their classifications. We encourage prospective authors to look at the classification scheme early, as it establishes a uniform context and may thus influence the presentation of their work. Authors must submit six copies of each full paper (no E-mail or FAX submissions) to the Program Chair. Papers should not exceed 6,000 words in length, and should be accompanied by full contact information including name, address, E-mail address, telephone number, and FAX number. Authors are also requested to submit the title, abstract, and classifications of each paper by E-mail to the Program Chair a month before the full paper is due (please include full contact information). All accepted papers will appear in the proceedings of the symposium, to be published by the IEEE Computer Society Press. The best papers will also be considered for publication in a special issue of the Requirements Engineering Journal. Important dates: 1 April 1996, title, abstract, and classifications requested; 1 May 1996, full papers due; 1 July 1996, notification of acceptance; 1 September 1996, camera-ready copy due. INFORMATION FOR INDUSTRIAL TRACK PRESENTERS Presentations relevant to products, problems, or results in requirements engineering in industry are solicited including: o Reports by industrial system or software developers on results or lessons learned in applying advanced requirements technology. o Reports by industrial system or software developers on current problem areas in elicitation, specification, or use of requirements that are not adequately addressed by available technology. o Reports by researchers on results or lessons learned in application of advanced requirements technology in an industrial setting. o Short presentations and demonstrations by vendors of new CASE tools or other products supporting requirements engineering. Presentations should describe current tool capabilities and ongoing developments. Reports by industrial participants or researches should be approximately 30 minutes in length; demonstrator presentations should be 10-15 minutes though full length presentations may be arranged on request. A paper is not required for industrial track presentations. Presenters should submit a title and abstract to the Industrial Track Chair. Selection criteria for this track include potential interest, relevance to the symposium and usability. Special consideration will be given to research/industry team presentations. Abstracts are due by 1 May 1996, while notifications of decision should be expected by 1 July 1996. INFORMATION FOR DOCTORAL STUDENTS In the doctoral consortium, students will present their work-in-progress to selected senior members of the Requirements Engineering community and their student peers, for purposes of feedback and discussion. Presenters will be selected on the basis of a research summary, not exceeding 5,000 words in length. The reports of presenters will be published as notes for consortium participants. Limited financial assistance will be available for presenters. Doctoral students should contact the Doctoral Consortium Chair for details. Research summaries are due by 15 September 1996, while notifications of decision should be expected by 1 November 1996. INFORMATION FOR POTENTIAL DEMONSTRATORS The symposium will provide free facilities for demonstration of selected tools. Potential demonstrators should submit a description of the system they propose to demonstrate, not to exceed 500 words, to Charles Payne Jr. by 1 July 1996. INFORMATION FOR TUTORIALS An invitation is extended for the presentation of tutorials on topics of general interest in requirements engineering. Please send tutorial proposals to John Marciniak, Tutorials Chair, by 1 August 1996. Provide the name or topic, a brief synopsis of the tutorial, the suggested length ( one half day or full day), and summary vita on the presenter(s). RE `97 ORGANIZING COMMITTEE General Chair: Connie Heitmeyer (heitmeyer@itd.nrl.navy.mil) Code 5546 High Assurance Computing System Branch U.S. Naval Research Laboratory Washington, DC 20375 voice:+1-202-767-3596 fax:+1-202-767-9197 Industrial Track Chair: Stuart Faulk (faulk@itd.nrl.navy.mil) voice:+1-202-404-6292 Doctoral Consortium Chair: Myla Archer (archer@itd.nrl.navy.mil) voice:+1-202-404-6304 Exhibits Co-Chairs: Charles Payne and Dwight Colby (cpayne@sctc.com, colby@sctc.com) Secure Computing Corporation 2675 Long Lake Rd. Roseville, MN 55113 USA voice:+1-612-628-1594 fax:+1-612-628-2701 Tutorials Chair: John Marciniak (marcin-alx1@kaman.com) Kaman Sciences Corporation 2560 Huntington Ave. Alexandria VA 22303-1410 USA voice:+1-703-329-7368 fax:+1-703-329-7197 Program Chair: John Mylopoulos (jm@cs.toronto.edu) Dept. of Computer Science University of Toronto 6 King's College Rd., rm. 283 Toronto, Ontario CANADA M5S 3H5 voice:+1-416-978-5180 fax:+1-416-978-1455 ********************************************************************** [14] From: olly@soi.city.ac.uk (Olly Gotel) Subject: EVENT: Making Requirements Measurable - A Workshop The Requirements Engineering Specialist Group of the British Computer Society presents... MAKING REQUIREMENTS MEASURABLE - A WORKSHOP Workshop chair: Suzanne Robertson (Atlantic Systems Guild) Date: Wednesday 15th May 1996 Time: 2:00pm - 5:30pm Venue: Room 418, Department of Computing, Imperial College, London INTRODUCTION Requirements traceability and quality assessment depends on requirements measurability. This workshop explores the idea that a requirement is measurable provided there is an unambiguous way of determining whether a given solution fits that requirement. Participants in this workshop examine requirements measurability by building a requirements specification for a familiar system. A requirements template will be used as a guide for the workshop. The workshop finishes with a discussion of how measurable requirements can be used to build a requirements quality filter. WHO SHOULD ATTEND? This is an interactive, participative workshop. Attendees must have a genuine interest in practical solutions to requirements specification. Practitioners involved in doing requirements engineering are particularly welcome. A limited number of student places are available, but the workshop will only be relevant to students who have had reasonable exposure to the problems of requirements engineering. The workshop is aimed at people who are interested in acquiring practical requirements engineering skills. Applicants for places at the workshop are encouraged to summarise their requirements engineering background and to explain why they wish to attend the workshop. WORKSHOP ORGANISATION The workshop is limited to 24 participants working in teams of no more than 4 people. Each team will have access to flip charts, transparencies and an overhead projector. Participants will receive a handout of about 35 pages, including a copy of the requirements template and an instruction summary. The requirements template contains 22 different types of requirements (about 30 pages). After the workshop the workshop organisers will amalgamate the requirements specified by all the teams and they will be made available to participants. CONTACT FOR PROGRAMME AND APPLICATION FORM Orlena Gotel (olly@soi.city.ac.uk) Or visit the group's web page at: http://www.OiT.co.uk/resg/ ********************************************************************** [15] From: bjornr@tts.lth.se (Bjorn Regnell) Subject: PAPER: Use Case Modelling I would like to take the opportunity to inform this list on a new paper on use case modelling. The paper is called: "A Hierarchical Use Case Model with Graphical Representation" by B. Regnell, M. Andersson, J. Bergstrand The abstract and postscript code can be retrieved at: http://www.tts.lth.se/Personal/Papers/ECBS96-abstr.html The paper will be published at ECBS96 (IEEE International Symposium on Engineering of Computer Based Systems, Friedrishhafen, Germany, 11-15 March) http://i50s19.ira.uka.de/ecbs96.html Any comments or questions are wellcome. ABSTRACT: Use case modelling is gaining increasing interest in computer-based systems engineering, especially in the earliest stages of system development, where requirements are elicited, documented and validated. This paper presents a conceptual framework for use case modelling and a new use case model with graphical representation, including support for different abstraction levels and mechanisms for managing large use case models. Current application of use cases in requirements engineering is discussed, as well as ontological and methodological issues related to use case modelling. The presented use case model has three levels of abstraction: Environment Level, relating use cases with actors and services; Structure Level, describing the episode structure of each use case; Event Level, describing stimuli, responses and system actions of each episode. All levels have graphical representation, and the paper gives examples of each level and explains the notation. The event level is described by an extension of Message Sequence Charts [ITU-T recommendation Z.120], with operators for alternative, repetition, exception and interrupt. Conclusions are given together with a discussion on further research. ********************************************************************** [16] From: doemges@picasso.informatik.rwth-aachen.de (Ralf Doemges) Subject: PAPERS: NATURE reports NATURE Lehrstuhl fuer Informatik V RWTH Aachen (Technical University of Aachen), Germany Department of Computer Science NATURE Report Series -------------------- All (electronically) available technical reports of the NATURE project (Novel Approaches to Theories Underlying Requirements) can be found at: Anonymous ftp address: ftp.informatik.rwth-aachen.de (137.226.112.172) Directory: /pub/NATURE World Wide Web (WWW) remote file: file://ftp.informatik.rwth-aachen.de/pub/packages/NATURE/ The reports are stored in compressed PostScript-Format. To get a specific report, transfer the desired file in binary mode and uncompress it. ********************************************************************** [17] From: emmerich@barney.soi.city.ac.uk (Wolfgang Emmerich) Subject: THESIS: Tool Construction for PSDEs based on Object Databases DOCTORAL THESIS: Tool Construction for Process-Centred Software Development Environments based on Object Databases Wolfgang Emmerich ABSTRACT: The aim of this thesis is to discuss the construction of tools for process-centred software development environments (PSDEs). Our main contribution is the proof that object database systems are a very suitable basis for improving the functionality of software development tools and for integrating them in PSDEs. We set out to prove this hypothesis following engineering principles rather than in an analytic or empiric way. We, therefore, first discuss the functionality that software developers require from tools contained in a PSDE. Starting from these requirements, we take the position of a tool builder and delineate requirements for a database system for document management purposes. We then review how well existing database systems satisfy these requirements. This results in the selection of object database systems as the most promising systems to take. We then propose a tool architecture that is based on object databases. We classify the components of this architecture into components that are common to any tool and thus can be reused and components that vary from tool to tool. We shall see that the most important varying component is the schema of the database. We propose tool specification languages that are capable of describing the tools' schemas as well as the other varying tool components at different levels of abstraction. These different levels of abstraction will provide the tool builder with the flexibility to define arbitrary syntax-directed tools. Then we discuss the construction of tools for the various languages identified above and their integration in GENESIS, an integrated environment for tool specification. After that, we outline the design and the implementation of compilers for our languages that generate executable tools. Finally, we evaluate the approach suggested in this thesis on the basis of two scenarios. These are tools for the GENESIS environment and tools for C++ class library development and maintenance, which we developed for the reuse departement of British Airways. AVAILABLE FROM: http://www.soi.city.ac.uk/homes/emmerich/publications/PHDTHESIS/phdthesis.html ********************************************************************** [18] From: olly@soi.city.ac.uk (Olly Gotel) Subject: THESIS: Contribution Structures for Requirements Traceability DOCTORAL THESIS: Contribution Structures for Requirements Traceability (August 1996) Orlena Gotel ABSTRACT: This thesis is concerned with the problem of requirements traceability (RT). In the context of systems and software engineering, RT refers to the ability to describe and follow the life of a requirement in both a forwards and backwards direction. Despite being highlighted as an area in need of improvement, being introduced as a mandatory activity in standards, and a recent surge in support, RT remains cited as a dominating problem. In recognising that RT problems are multifaceted in nature, and that there is unlikely to be an all-encompassing solution, we attribute their persistence to the lack of thorough problem analysis. Prevailing approaches to RT are inadequate because, being primarily solution-driven, they fail to account for the underlying issues which perpetuate RT problems in practice. Based upon findings from an empirical analysis of the RT problem, we suggest that the crux of the RT problem revolves around the paucity of information about the human sources of requirements. We found that practitioners claim to have experienced RT problems when, being unable to retrieve information about requirements, they have further been unable to identify those in a position to supply it. We propose that, by making the social structure that gave rise to requirements explicit and open to interrogation, a basis would be provided for tackling this issue. To provide such a basis, this thesis presents an approach through which the contribution structure underlying requirements artifacts can be defined and maintained. This enables conventional forms of artifact-based RT to be extended with contribution structures to accommodate the forms of personnel-based RT that practitioners were found to need. Experience with a prototype tool and a case study further demonstrates how the approach provides a feasible and practical solution to the crux of the RT problem and corroborates the thesis. AVAILABLE FROM: ftp_host: dse.doc.ic.ac.uk dir: dse_papers/viewpoints file: olly_phd_thesis.ps.gz http://src.doc.ic.ac.uk/public/ic.doc/dse/viewpoints/olly_phd_thesis.ps.gz ********************************************************************** [19] From: pohl@picasso.informatik.rwth-aachen.de (Klaus Pohl) Subject: PROCEEDINGS: REFSQ '95 R E F S Q ' 9 5 - proceedings and workshop summary REFSQ`95, was held in conjunction with CAiSE`95 in Jyvaskyla, Finland on June 12th and 13th 1995. The proceedings of the workshop were published by Augustinus Verlag and can be ordered by sending an email to {peter,pohl}@informatik.rwth-aachen.de (they will cost 40,-- German Marks (17 eng. pound or 27 US$) (cash) or 50.-- German Marks (21 eng. pound or 36 US$ (cheque)) ********************************************************************** [20] From: billbolton@acslink.net.au (Bill Bolton) Subject: INFORMATION: QFD Mailing List QFD-L Purpose ------------- QFD-L is a mailing list devoted to the discussion of Quality Function Deployment. It is intended as a forum for discussion of questions, issues, lessons learned, best practices, research topics, and sources of additional information. Consultants, educators, researchers, and users are encouraged to participate by posting substantive messages to the list. Announcements of conferences, workshops, and new publications are welcome, but overtly commercial advertisements are not permitted. Subscribers should expect to see such announcements on occasion, and submitters should limit announcements to the specifics of dates, places, technical content, and contact points for additional information. QFD as it is currently practiced evolved in Japan as a way to incorporate knowledge about the needs and desires of end-user customers into all stages of the design, manufacture, delivery, and support of products and services. It comprises several information collection and dissemination techniques, decision making processes, and quantitative engineering practices. It is widely used in the automotive industry in Japan and the United States, and is being rapidly adopted in a number of other application domains, including electronics, aerospace, biomedical, software, government, military, and service industries. Subscription and posting information ------------------------------------ To add yourself to the QFD-L list, address an e-mail message to: majordomo@quality.org with ONLY the following text in the BODY of your message: subscribe QFD-L To get additional information about QFD-L without subscribing, send this message: info QFD-L ********************************************************************** [21] From: acwf@cs.city.ac.uk (Anthony Finkelstein) Subject: an interesting job opportunity... Teaching Company Scheme (TCS) Project City University (Department of Computer Science) & QSS Ltd. A Teaching Company Scheme (TCS) between City University (Department of Computer Science) & QSS Ltd has been established. The TCS provides an opportunity for "top flight" graduates (called Teaching Company Associates) to work on advanced R&D projects in industry supported by a University link. The scheme is funded by the DTI. In addition Teaching Company Associates are provided with an industry training programme and can register for a postgraduate degree. The scheme between City University & QSS Ltd involves research on software engineering - specifically the development of novel tools and interfaces to support "requirements traceability" and document management. City University is a recognised centre of research excellence in software engineering. QSS Ltd is a small, high tech software house located in the centre of Edinburgh and at the Oxford University Science Park. They produce an advanced requirements tool based on object-oriented database technology. Two posts are available within the project. They would suit a graduate with a good background in computer science and software engineering. If you are interested please contact Anthony Finkelstein (acwf@cs.city.ac.uk) or Kristen Johnson-Westwood (101510.2303@compuserve.com) including a short email CV. **********************************************************************