Towards an Approach to Pattern-based Domain-Specific Requirements Engineering

TL;DR

Pattern-based requirements patterns are domain-independent and insufficient for domain-specific quality assurance and verification. The authors propose a Pattern-based Domain-Specific RE (DSR) framework that collects domain knowledge and encodes it into graphical DSRs to enable automated QA and system verification, demonstrated on UAV take-off scenarios. A Take-Off Performance DSR serves as a concrete exemplar, implemented in AutoFOCUS3 and integrated with defect-based testing to explore testing prioritization via input-space partitioning and scenario generation. The work adds domain-aware requirements specification, quality assurance mechanisms, and a pathway toward practice validation and cross-domain scalability, including extensions to non-functional concerns.

Abstract

Requirements specification patterns have received much attention as they promise to guide the structured specification of natural language requirements. By using them, the intention is to reduce quality problems related to requirements artifacts. Patterns may need to vary in their syntax (e.g. domain details/ parameter incorporation) and semantics according to the particularities of the application domain. However, pattern-based approaches, such as EARS, are designed domain-independently to facilitate their wide adoption across several domains. Little is yet known about how to adopt the principle idea of pattern-based requirements engineering to cover domain-specificity in requirements engineering and, ideally, integrate requirements engineering activities into quality assurance tasks. In this paper, we propose the Pattern-based Domain-specific Requirements Engineering Approach for the specification of functional and performance requirements in a holistic manner. This approach emerges from an academia-industry collaboration and is our first attempt to frame an approach which allows for analyzing domain knowledge and incorporating it into the requirements engineering process enabling automated checks for requirements quality assurance and computer-aided support for system verification. Our contribution is two-fold: First, we present a solution to pattern-based domain-specific requirements engineering and its exemplary integration into quality assurance techniques. Second, we showcase a proof of concept using a tool implementation for the domain of flight controllers for Unmanned Aerial Vehicles. Both shall allow us to outline next steps in our research agenda and foster discussions in this direction.

Figures (3)

• Figure 1: an Approach to Pattern-based Domain-Specific RE
• Figure 2: Take-Off Performance DSR Prototype in AutoFOCUS3.
• Figure 3: Illustration of Defect-Values for Partitions.