Presentation Abstract

A pragmatic approach to overcoming undocumented requirements.

This is a presentation based on the article that Johanna and I wrote for Software Testing and Quality Engineering Magazine, Volume 1, Issue 2, in March/April of 1999. To date, Testing in the Dark has been the most commented upon article that STQE Magazine has published.

In this presentation we discuss an analytical technique for discovering undocumented requirements, how to refine and distill rough requirements to obtain their essence, and how to base your acceptance testing on the refined requirements.

About the Author

Brian Lawrence (Coyote Valley Software) teaches and facilitates requirements analysis, peer reviews, project planning, risk management, life cycles, and design specification techniques.

He has served as a program chair for the SEPG'97 Conference as well as the IEEE Computer Society's 1998 International Conference on Requirements Engineering. Brian is the technical editor of Software Testing and Quality Engineering Magazine and serves on the editorial board of IEEE Software.

Johanna Rothman (Rothman Consulting, Inc.) observes and consults on managing high technology product development. She works with her clients to find the leverage points that will increase their effectiveness as organizations and as managers, helping them ship the right product at the right time, and recruit and retain the best people.

Johanna is the founder and principal of Rothman Consulting Group, Inc., and is ASQ certified as a Quality Auditor and Software Quality Engineer.