Effective requirements engineering

A traditional view of requirements from systems engineering.

Everyone should have effective requirements engineering. Everyone should have efficient requirements management. It would be nice to have a way to know that your work with requirements is well spent. The question is more easily asked than answered.

Continue reading

I need help with home automation IoT

Today, I am starting on a new project. I am going to automate my hen-house and I need your help to do it. I have never really been a gadget person. I have used the same personal computer at home since I built it from spare parts in 2003. I don’t own a tablet or a smart watch. I chop my wood with an axe, not a machine. It’s not that I don’t like gadgets, I just don’t see the business case. Continue reading

Agile projects requirements breakdown structure

fibonacci series in nature

In Agile projects, when a set of requirements are received from Clients, it may consist of (a mix of) A few needs, objectives, goals and some partial stories (even though it would have come in a structured document). Re-organizing (re-arranging) those into a requirements breakdown structure (RBS) helps ask right questions to…

Continue reading

Change is the only constant in agile

Neon sign: change. Change is the only constant.

[bibshow] How much change can a project withstand before it is too much? A requirements change rate of above 20% is probably too much [bibcite key=”citeulike:13415962″]. Typical rules of thumb figures for software development requirements change rate is cited as 1-3% [bibcite key=”citeulike:321639″]. But the rate of change is accelerating.…

Continue reading

You don’t Need User Stories to be Agile

Someone probably told you that you must have user stories to be Agile, right? But really, you don’t need user stories to be agile! I would have you consider what kinds of stakeholders and requirements you have and are trying to meet. Continue reading

Agile Change Requests

Gold dollar symbols falling through an hourglass 3d Rendering.

There are change requests and then there are agile change requests. Now, I hear some of you saying to yourselves: “He is crazy, there is no such thing as ‘agile change request’!” You are right, partly, I agree that agile methods were designed to avoid change requests. But! All change…

Continue reading

Selecting a Requirements Engineering Tool

Choosing the ring. An oil painting.

Selecting a requirements engineering tool has always been a pain for me. Personally I have had experience with Rational CQ, Rational ReqPro, Jira, CodeBeamer and finally Excel. Requirements Engineering Model I would say that a thorough evaluation of an RE tool starts with your own clear vision of how to…

Continue reading

IT Procurement and Requirements

How do organizations procure their IT? Do they get what they asked for? Do they get what they need? These questions will be the theme for my attention for a while. Requirements and Acceptance The first thing that came to my mind when I first started discussing these issues with…

Continue reading

Requirements Precision

Requirements need to be more precise than just “making sense”.

Continue reading

Agile Requirements and the Agile Backlog

Are backlog items and requirements the same thing?

Continue reading