Oscar López

Reuse, Standardization, and Transformation of Requirements

Correct requirements determination is a critical factor in software development. Having stored reusable requirements elements, both qualified and classified, in a repository might contribute to reducing the error probability in requirements specifications but the diversity of requirements formats is a constraint for their reuse. To solve this problem, a common requirements model allowing the standardization and transformation of some types of requirements in others is presented. The transformations use an intermediate representation based on Petri nets, which provides rigor to the models and allows its consistency to be checked. Transformation algorithms are defined and implemented as part of a requirements management and reuse tool.

Automatic Generation of Use Cases from Workflows: A Petri Net Based Approach

This paper presents automatic generation of use cases as an alternative both to speeding up requirements elicitation and formalizing the obtained use cases to approach the requirements reuse. We propose a framework for requirements documentation as use cases that might be included in coarse grain reusable structures. In order to effectively integrate the software requirements in reusable components, adequate models promoting reusability are required. Hence, we accomplish the requirement elicitation through a process using Workflows and Petri nets. This process gives an analytical treatment to system requirements which are stored in a repository.

Software process and reuse: A required unification

Conventional software processes such as the Unified Process do not include reuse techniques among their disciplines. In this article, we present an extension of the Unified Process that introduces software reuse with minimal disturbance by means of the definition of a new process for product line engineering and the adaptation of standard disciplines for specific product construction. This proposal reduces the money and time costs related to the progressive introduction of software reuse in an organization. Some tools that provide support to the process, including a requirement reuse tool and a repository of reusable elements, have been developed.