Date: Mon, 22 Feb 93 10:16:44 GMT To: re-world@doc.ic.ac.uk From: acwf@doc.ic.ac.uk (Anthony Finkelstein) X-Sender: acwf@gummo.doc.ic.ac.uk Subject: REQUIREMENTS ENGINEERING NEWSLETTER (4) Cc: acwf@doc.ic.ac.uk ****************REQUIREMENTS ENGINEERING NEWSLETTER******************* No. 4. Contents 1. If architects had to work like programmers (Martin Feather) 2. CFP IJCAI-93 Workshop on Computational Models of Conflict Management (Steve Easterbrook) 3. Public Domain Tools (Steve Frezza) Contributions to: re-list@doc.ic.ac.uk (will be moderated) Subscription or Removal to: re-request@doc.ic.ac.uk Back issues can be obtained via anonymous ftp from ftp-host: dse.doc.ic.ac.uk (IP number: 146.169.2.20). Directory: requirements. Files are called renl1, renl2, etc. If you cannot use ftp then you can get any back issues using email. Send email containing the following to ftpmail@doc.ic.ac.uk open dse.doc.ic.ac.uk cd requirements get quit ********************************************************************** Contributions, CFPs, questions and comments welcomed. ********************************************************************** From: Martin Feather Subject: requirements, house architects Here's some fodder for all those requirements techniques & technologies, extracted from Article 12427 of comp.software-eng: ...All these references to building houses and architects reminded me of an article that I read in the humor newsgroup. Because of its pertinence, I have taken the liberty to include it here. ******************* If architects had to work like programmers Dear Mr. Architect: Please design and build me a house. I am not quite sure of what I need, so you should use your discretion. My house should have between two and forty-five bedrooms. Just make sure the plans are such that the bedrooms can be easily added or deleted. When you bring the blueprints to me, I will make the final decision of what I want. Also, bring me the cost breakdown for each configuration so that I can arbitrarily pick one. Keep in mind that the house I ultimately choose must cost less than the one I am currently living in. Make sure, however, that you correct all the deficiencies that exist in my current house (the floor of my kitchen vibrates when I walk across it, and the walls don't have nearly enough insulation in them). As you design, also keep in mind that I want to keep yearly maintenance costs as low as possible. This should mean the incorporation of extra-cost features like aluminum, vinyl, or composite siding. (If you choose not to specify aluminum, be prepared to explain your decision in detail.) Please take care that modern design practices and the latest materials are used in construction of the house, as I want it to be a showplace for the most up-to-date ideas and methods. Be alerted, however, that kitchen should be designed to accommodate, among other things, my 1952 Gibson refrigerator. To insure that you are building the correct house for our entire family, make certain that you contact each of our children, and also our in-laws. My mother-in-law will have very strong feelings about how the house should be designed, since she visits us at least once a year. Make sure that you weigh all of thses options carefully and come to the right decision. I, however, retain the right to overrule any choices that you make. Please don't bother me with small details right now. Your job is to develop the overall plans for the house: get the big picture. At this time, for example, it is not appropriate to be choosing the color of the carpet. However, keep in mind that my wife likes blue. Also, do not worry at this time about acquiring the resources to build the house itself. Your first priority is to develop detailed plans and specifications. Once I approve these plans, however, I would expect the house to be under roof within 48 hours. While you are designing this house specifically for me, keep in mind that sooner or later I will have to sell it to someone else. It therefore should have appeal to a wide variety of potential buyers. Please make sure before you finalize the plans that there is a consensus of the population in my area that they like the features this house has. I advise you to run up and look at my neighbor's house he constructed last year. We like it a great deal. It has many features that we would also like in our new home, particularily the 75-foot swimming pool. With careful engineering, I believe that you can design this into our new house without impacting the final cost. Please prepare a complete set of blueprints. It is not necessary at this time to do the real design, since they will be used only for construction bids. Be advised, however, that you will be held accountable for any increase of construction costs as a result of later design changes. You must be thrilled to be working on as an interesting project as this! To be able to use the latest techniques and materials and to be given such freedom in your designs is something that can't happen very often. Contact me as soon as possible with your complete ideas and plans. PS: My wife has just told me that she disagrees with many of the instructions I've given you in this letter. As architect, it is your responsibility to resolve these differences. I have tried in the past and have been unable to accomplish this. If you can't handle this responsibility, I will have to find another architect. PPS: Perhaps what I need is not a house at all, but a travel trailer. Please advise me as soon as possible if this is the case. -------------------------------------- Lobsang Gyalpo lobsang@vnaact.dec.com Systems Development & Engineering Digital Equipment Corporation Vienna Austria Tel : (222) 60105-5166 X25 : 262210214201::GYALPO x400: X=AT;A=ADA;P=Digital;O=Digital;OU=VNO ------------------------------------------- ************************************************************************** From: steveea@cogs.susx.ac.uk (Steve Easterbrook) Subject: IJCAI-93 Workshop on Computational Models of Conflict Management in Cooperative Problem Solving Call For Papers =============== IJCAI-93 Workshop on Computational Models of Conflict Management in Cooperative Problem Solving Monday August 30, 1993 Chambery, France Description ----------- A central aspect of cooperative problem solving by groups is the avoidance, detection and resolution of conflicts among the participants. This is of great theoretical interest in such research areas as distributed artificial intelligence. It is also of considerable practical importance because of the key role conflict management plays in cooperative problem solving e.g. in concurrent engineering. Work on conflict management has occurred in a variety of settings including concurrent engineering, multi-agent planning & design, AI and Law, distributed AI (including game theory), GDSS (group decision support systems), CSCW (computer-supported cooperative work), software engineering, sociology, organizational science, public policy and international relations. This work thus includes theoretical groundwork, empirical studies and implemented conflict management systems for human and computational agents. Despite wide-spread interest, however, there have been few opportunities for researchers addressing these issues in different areas to explore commonalities and benefit from the differing insights each have achieved. The goal of this workshop is to facilitate this kind of cross-fertilization process. The workshop will focus on several key themes: * What lessons do empirical studies of conflict management have to offer for the development of computational models? * What are the current theoretical underpinnings for conflict management, and how can they be applied to practical problems? * How can computers support group conflict management with both human and computational participants? What are the benefits and challenges of the different approaches? * What aspects of conflict management are generic and what are domain-specific? Can the same techniques work with human and computational participants? * How do computational models of conflict management fare in real-world social and organisational settings? Through exploring such themes it is hoped the participants will have a better idea about how they can use related work from other areas, and can begin to outline a single general theory of conflict management that works across multiple domains. Workshop Information -------------------- This full day workshop is part of the Workshop Program for IJCAI-93 (the International Joint Conference on Artificial Intelligence) and will be held in Chambery, France on Monday, August 30, 1993. The workshop will consist of four moderated 75 minute sessions, each made up of: * a brief (5-10 minute) moderators' overview of common themes and key issues * four 10 minute presentations (including questions): presenters will be asked to follow a results-oriented format and to address key issues identified by the moderators. * a discussion panel wherein presenters field questions from the audience and each other. This should be focused on shared issues rather than further explanation of the participant's individual work. Workshop participants will also be invited to display posters describing their work. Please note that each attendee must have registered for the main conference and is required to pay an additional 300 FF (about $60 US) fee for the workshop. IJCAI has offered to exempt the workshop fee for one student attendee if he or she agrees to be in charge of taking notes for the whole day. Please let me know if you are interested. Submissions ----------- Participation is by invitation only, and will be limited to approximately 35 people of which 16 will be presenters. Those who wish to attend the workshop should submit four copies of a research abstract no more than 5 pages long focusing on the main contribution of their work in preference to general introductory material, literature review etc. All submissions will be reviewed by researchers working in a related area. Please include a brief abstract, the author's electronic and physical address information, and indicate if you would like to display a poster on your work at the workshop. Electronic submissions will be accepted only if they are in pure ascii or binhexed Macintosh Word/MacWrite format. Submission deadline: March 1, 1993 Notification date: April 1, 1993 Final date for revised papers: June 1, 1993 We expect that revised versions of the best papers from the workshop will be considered for inclusion in an appropriate journal or published collection. Submissions and questions regarding the workshop should be directed to: Mark Klein Boeing Computer Services PO Box 24346, 7L-64 Seattle, WA 98124-0346 USA mklein@atc.boeing.com Voice: (206) 865-3412 Fax: (206) 865-2964 Organizing Committee -------------------- Steve Easterbrook University of Sussex Easterbrook@cogs.susx.ac.uk Mark Klein Boeing Computer Services mklein@atc.boeing.com Victor Lesser University of Massachusetts lesser@cs.umass.edu Stephen C-Y. Lu University of Illinois lu@kbesrl.me.uiuc.edu Katia P. Sycara Carnegie Mellon University katia@cs.cmu.edu *********************************************************************** From: frezza@ee.pitt.edu (Steve Frezza) Subject: Public Domain Tools We're looking for any public-domain Requirements Engineering Systems that might be available (or made available). Specifically, we am looking for a system that develops and manipulates the requirements specification for hardware/software systems. Any advice as to where to look, or who to ask would be greatly appreciated. We are particularly interested in public-domain software becase a) we have no money, b) we expect to have to extend the representations/code to support our research (so we want the source code), and c) we plan on making our work public-domain as well; it is part of a publicly-funded university research project. ************************************************************************