Paper Info
Title
Requirements volatility in software architecture design: an exploratory case study.
Abstract
Requirements volatility is a major issue in software (SW) development, causing problems such as project delays and cost overruns. Even though there is a considerable amount of research related to requirement volatility, the majority of it is inclined toward project management aspects. The relationship between SW architecture design and requirements volatility has not been researched widely, even though changing requirements may for example lead to higher defect density during testing. An exploratory case study was conducted to study how requirements volatility affects SW architecture design. Fifteen semi-structured, thematic interviews were conducted in the case company, which provides the selection of software products for business customers and consumers. The research revealed the factors, such as requirements uncertainty and dynamic business environment, causing requirements volatility in the case company. The study identified the challenges that requirements volatility posed to SW architecture design, including scheduling and architectural technical debt. In addition, this study discusses means of mitigating the factors that cause requirements volatility and addressing the challenges posed by requirements volatility. SW architects are strongly influenced by requirement volatility. Thus understanding the factors causing requirements volatility as well as means to mitigate the challenges has high industrial relevance.
Year
DOI
Venue
2017
10.1145/3084100.3084105
ICSSP
Keywords
Field
DocType
Requirement management, software architecture
Systems engineering,Scheduling (computing),Risk analysis (engineering),Requirements management,Software,Business requirements,Technical debt,Software architecture,Engineering,Volatility (finance),Project management
Conference
Citations 
PageRank 
References 
0
0.34
38
Authors
5
Name
Order
Citations
PageRank
Sanja Aaramaa1164.66
Sandun Dasanayake271.79
Markku Oivo365081.11
Jouni Markkula425025.91
Samuli Saukkonen531.80