Software Requirements Engineering, 2nd Edition [Paperback]

Richard H. Thayer (Editor), Merlin Dorfman (Editor)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0818677384 | ISBN-13: 978-0818677380 | Publication Date: February 27, 1997 | Edition: 2

This new edition describes current best practices in requirements engineering with a focus primarily on software systems but also on systems that may contain other elements such as hardware or people. The text consists of original papers, written by experts in the field, plus revisions of papers from the first edition. The book begins with an introduction to current issues and the basic terminology of the software requirements engineering process.

The text covers the five phases of software requirements engineering -- elicitation, analysis, specification, verification, and management -- that need to be performed to reduce the chance of software failure. The chapters look at the science and discipline that concern establishing and documenting software requirements. The book covers the process through which developers' and users' discover, review, articulate, and understand the users' needs and the constraints on the software and development activity. It analyzes the users' needs to arrive at a definition of their software requirements. In addition, the papers examine software requirements and the need to clearly document and precisely record each requirement. It also looks at verification to ensure that the software requirements specifications are in compliance with the system requirements and conforms to document standards. The last phase addressed by the book is software requirements management including planning and controlling of all these activities.

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

This new edition describes current best practices in requirements engineering with a focus primarily on software systems but also on systems that may contain other elements such as hardware or people. The text consists of original papers, written by experts in the fields, plus reprints of survey articles on many aspects of requirements engineering. The book begins with an introduction to current issues and the basic terminology of the software requirements engineering process. In addition, the text covers the five basic phases of software requirements engineering: elicitation, analysis, specification, verification, and management. The book:

• Looks at the science and discipline of establishing and documenting software requirements
• Describes the process through which developers' and users' discover, review, articulate, and understand the users' needs and the constraints on the software and development
• Shows how to analyzes the users' needs to arrive at a definition of their software requirements
• Examines software requirements and the need to clearly document and precisely record each requirement
• Looks at verification to ensure that the software requirements specifications are in compliance with the system requirements and conform to document standards
• Details software requirements management including planning and controlling of all these activities.

About the Author

Richard H. Thayer, PhD, is a Professor of Computer Science at California State University, Sacramento, California, United States of America. He travels widely where he consults and lectures on software requirements analysis, software engineering, project management, software engineering standards, and software quality assurance. He is a Visiting Researcher at the University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, Scotland. As an expert in software project management and requirements engineering, he is a consultant to many companies and government agencies.
Thayer is a Senior Member of the IEEE Computer Society and the IEEE Software Engineering Standards Subcommittee. He is Chairperson for the Working Group for a Standard for a Software Project Management Plans. He is a Distinguished Visitor for the IEEE Computer Society.
He is also an Associate Fellow of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) where he served on the AIAA Technical Committee on Computer Systems, and he is a member of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM). He is also a registered professional engineer.
He has a BSEE and an MS degree from the University of Illinois at Urbana (1962) and a PhD from the University of California at Santa Barbara (1979) all in Electrical Engineering.
He has edited and/or co-edited numerous tutorials for the IEEE Computer Society Press: Software Engineering Project Management (1988), System and Software Requirements Engineering (1990), and Software Engineering--A European Prospective (1992). He is the author of over 40 technical papers and reports on software project management, software engineering, and software engineering standards and is an invited speaker at many national and international software engineering conferences and workshops.

Merlin Dorfman, PhD, is a Technical Consultant in the Space Systems Product Center, Lockheed Martin Missiles and Space Company, Sunnyvale, Calif. He specializes in systems engineering for software-intensive systems (requirements analysis, top-level architecture, and performance evaluation), in software process improvement, and in algorithm developments for data processing systems. He has performed concept exploration, system implementation, and operations and maintenance of data systems and has worked on proposal teams and company-funded technology projects as well as on development contracts. He was in charge of the development of the Automated Requirements Traceability System (ARTS). He was the first chairman of Space Systems Division's Software Engineering Process Group. He represented the Lockheed Corporation on the Embedded Computer Software Committee of the Aerospace Industries Association, and was Vice-Chairman of the Committee.
He has a BS and MS from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a PhD from Stanford University, all in Aeronautics and Astronautics. He is a registered Professional Engineer in the state of California and Colorado and is a member of the Tau Beta Pi and Sigma Gamma Tau honorary societies.

Product Details

• Paperback: 504 pages
• Publisher: Wiley-IEEE Computer Society Pr; 2 edition (February 27, 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0818677384
• ISBN-13: 978-0818677380
• Product Dimensions: 10.9 x 8.4 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.5 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #719,173 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Timeless reference for the software professional, March 14, 2000

By 

E. Cancelada "ESC" (Portsmouth, NH USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Software Requirements Engineering, 2nd Edition (Paperback)

The book contains a carefully selected collection of articles on requirements engineering by many well-known authors. Some of the articles are original milestone papers (Boehm's on Spiral Process), some are specifically created or adopted for this publication(A.Davis's survey of documenting techniques). Thayer and Dorfman suceeded at maintaining a fine balance between being academic and practical. They do not advocate any methods or processes - they just present the best of accumulated knowledge. I shall warn that it can be a bit taxing read if you are a faint-hearted. But if you strive to be a professional, you will rip long-term benefits from (reading at least some of) the articles. The curious practitioner will have an opportunity to understand what software requirements are and where they fit into software process. Recommendation: buy now.