Exploring Software Practitioners Perceptions and Experience in Requirements Reuse An Empirical Study in Malaysia

Abstract

In Software Product Lines development, reuse process are planned ahead of time, while in traditional software development reuse can occur opportunistically: unplanned or in ad hoc manner.  Core assets that can be reused in SPL include requirements, architectures, design documents, test cases and more.  Although many research efforts in SPL focuses on issues related to architectures, designs and codes reuse, research on requirements reuse has received slightly less attention from researchers and practitioners.  Requirements reuse in Software Product Line is the process of systematically reusing previously defined and validated requirements for an earlier software products and applying them to a new slightly different product within similar domain. Realizing the benefits of reusing requirements like increasing productivity and expediting time to market by using pre-verified requirements, it is essential to look at the current practice and experience in requirements reuse. Hence, this study is conducted with two objectives: firstly, to identify the factors influencing software practitioners in requirements reuse practice and secondly, to assess the factors hindering software practitioner’s from reusing requirements in software development, both from Malaysian context. The survey results confirm seven factors that can influence RR practice in Malaysia.  In addition we also revealed three main impediments to requirements reuse practice in Malaysia. The first is due to the unavailability of requirements reuse tools or framework to select requirements for reuse. The second one is pertaining to the conditions of existing requirements to be reused (incomplete, poorly structured or not kept updated). The third to be the lack of awareness and RR education among software practitioners pertaining to the systematic requirements reuse.