Abd-El-Kader Sahraoui

A situational method engineering approach to requirements elicitation workshops in the software development process

The elicitation of requirements for software systems is one of the most critical and complex activities within the development lifecycle. Although the subject has received some degree of attention in the research literature, there remains a need for situational methods and processes that can be easily utilized by the majority of practitioners in typical projects. In this paper we present a flexible yet systematic approach to the early stages of requirements elicitation in software development, based on collaborative workshops and the construction of a lightweight situational method, within a general process framework. The research provides practitioners with an approach to requirements elicitation that can be readily applied to real-world projects in order to improve both the process and the results. The work also offers researchers an example of how lightweight situational method engineering can be applied to very practical activities and situations in the software process. Copyright

Towards a collaborative and combinational approach to requirements elicitation within a systems engineering framework

Despite its critical importance to the process of systems development, requirements elicitation continues to be a major problem in both research and practice. This complex activity involving many different facets and issues is often performed badly and subsequently blamed for project failure and poor quality systems. In this paper, we present a collaborative and combinational approach to requirements elicitation within a systems engineering framework, proposing the application of current research from other disciplines in areas related to requirements elicitation, such as software engineering and the social sciences, to a general systems engineering context. The work provides both researchers and practitioners with an approach to requirements elicitation for systems engineering that can be applied to real world projects to improve both the process and results, thereby increasing the overall chance of successful system development in terms of on schedule and on budget delivery, and satisfied customers.

Modeling and rapid prototyping of avionics using STATEMATE

The paper presents a methodology and an experiment for rapid avionics prototyping using the STATEMATE environment. The methodology is based on SA-RT structured analysis principles. It shows first the context of STATEMATE use in the current avionics development process. Therefore, it sets up some key steps and use recommendations in order to enhance the modeling quality The experiment deals with the re-design of all existing avionics system that is part of the AIRBUS A340 on-board systems family. It highlights the STATEMATE modeling, validation and rapid prototyping facilities. Results and perspectives are also outlined.

Co-specification for co-design in the development of avionics systems

Abstract Hardware-software concurrent design, referred to as “co-design”, is a new methodology that integrates the development of both hardware and software. It is made up mainly by the steps of specification, partitioning, and prototyping. This paper addresses the specification step. It proposes a specification paradigm based on the use of more than one single language. This approach is referred to as “co-specification”. It deals with formalizing the requirements through several partial specifications. These are therefore composed in a unified model that is used for later co-design steps. The approach is illustrated through the specification of an avionics system that is part of the Airbus A340 on-board systems family.

System Engineering and PLM As an Integrated Approach for Industry Collaboration Management

Abstract The aircraft sector is currently changing, such as automotive sector twenty years ago. This tends to modify changes the OEM and suppliers relationship. One of the main OEM developments perspectives is the supplier vertical integration, early in the product life cycle. This suppliers vertical integration should allow added value by increasing products and process innovations proposition. For the supplier this integration means developing new skills, new organization and new tools. Collaboration is done in several ways. These modes are not easy to implement for SMEs and evolve over time. For this, we must implement a PLM tool that will facilitate these modes of cooperation and especially to allow the transition between these modes. The PLM tool is specified according to a system engineering (SE) deployment.

On systems engineering deployment and requirements evolution

The paper is on systems engineering deployment and requirements evolution issues. The approach presented relies on the necessity for systems engineering deployment as a way to customize such concepts for specific applications; a case study is given concerning product lifecycle management (PLM); in the other hand the requirements evolution aspect is addressed in a systems engineering framework and the study analysis of the its impacts on safety issues.

Aligning systems engineering and project management standards to improve the management of processes

For achieving the success of the project, relying on the systems engineering processes or project management processes is not sufficient and projects often fail due to deficient systems engineering practices or project management practices, or, at least, due to a lack of a coherency/consistency between the two aspects. So it is necessary to correctly implement systems engineering and project management processes during the whole project. This issue of SE and PM integration lies at the very heart of current research concerns. It is at the core of economic and industrial concerns. The goal of this paper is to analyze and compare the five important systems engineering standards (ANSI/EIA 632, ISO/IEC 15288, IEEE 1220, INCOSE Handbook and SEBoK) and the two project management standards (PMBoK and ISO 21500) to evaluate the consistency and inconsistency in order to facilitate the management of the projects and improve their possibility of success.

A multi-formalisms approach for codesign in the development of avionics

This paper presents a new approach in the development of avionics at AEROSPATIALE. The approach is based on a selective use of specification languages. Its aim is to compose partial avionics specifications in a unified format which is used for later concurrent hardware/software design steps. A demonstrator of the approach is currently in progress. It deals with the re-design of an avionics on-board system that belongs to the family of AIRBUS A340. The multi-languages specification is achieved through three graphical specification languages: Harels StateCharts, SDL and SAO. The status of work and future perspectives are outlined.

Using Object Oriented Methods in a System Lifecycle Process Model

Abstract The paper proposes a technique of mapping an object oriented method (OMT) onto a software lifecycle process model (Development Standard for the German Federal Armed Forces Process (V-Model)). This technique is extended by the integration another established technique on the use of object oriented paradigm in system engineering. The combination of both techniques can be a preliminary step in bridging the gap between a software lifecycle development processes in software engineering and system engineering. Difficulties are discussed and perspectives for such work are presented.

Expression of Temporal Constraints: A Syntactic Way

Abstract The works presented are founded on (Delfieu, 1995). They are based upon the principle that a temporal constraint is defined like a set of temporised traces. A temporised trace is a sequence of events where time is introduced by the occurrence of a special event. Those traces have common syntactic characteristic. The interest of the formalisation of these characteristics is to establish syntactic properties on the full set of traces.