Software Requirements Inspections Using PBR and Support Tooling

• Luís Felipe Santos Silva UFRJ
• Wladmir Araújo Chapetta UFRJ
• Guilherme Horta Travassos UFRJ

DOI: https://doi.org/10.5753/sbqs.2004.16186

Abstract

Artifact’s defects occurrence is almost inevitable. To identify these defects counting just on testing activities is extremely risky. Quality issues should be addressed in every artifact produced throughout the software development process, since quality cannot be imposed when the software product is finished. The costs related to software testing, isolation, correction and retesting are higher than the costs related to the identification of defects as soon as they are inserted into the produced software artifacts. Software inspections aim to reduce the number of defects transmitted from one development phase to another. Considering the software inspection process, defects identification can be accomplished by applying an ad-hoc fashion, through checklists or using a specific technique. Perspective-Based Reading (PBR) was created to support defects identification in software requirements documents written in natural language. PBR has been submitted to several empirical studies and the resulting observations motivated us to define a tool to support it, having the hypothesis that it would be able to reduce inspections total time. A feasibility study conducted with graduate students gave us some indication that our hypothesis may be true and tool usage is feasible.

Keywords: Software inspections, Reading Techniques, Experimental Software Engineering

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