Element quality indicator: A quality assessment and defect detection method for software requirement specification

Qiang Zhi; Li Gong; Jianguo Ren; Meiyu Liu; Zhengshu Zhou; Shuichiro Yamamoto

doi:10.1016/j.heliyon.2023.e16469

Element quality indicator: A quality assessment and defect detection method for software requirement specification

Heliyon. 2023 May 20;9(5):e16469. doi: 10.1016/j.heliyon.2023.e16469. eCollection 2023 May.

Authors

Qiang Zhi¹, Li Gong¹, Jianguo Ren¹, Meiyu Liu¹, Zhengshu Zhou², Shuichiro Yamamoto³

Affiliations

¹ School of Computer Science and Technology, Jiangsu Normal University, China.
² Research & Development Group, Hitachi, Ltd., Yokohama, 2440817, Japan.
³ Graduate School of Informatics, Nagoya University, Japan.

Abstract

A software requirements specification (SRS) provides a detailed description of the requirements of a software system that is to be developed. The Element Quality Indicator (EQI) is a novel method to detect defects and assess the quality of an SRS. It does not hinge on review guidelines and is based on the SRS element questions extraction method (EQEM). In this study, we optimized the EQI and carried out a systematic and comprehensive experiment to validate and evaluate its effectiveness. The controlled experiment, which included 60 software engineering students, found that 100% of the subjects identified defects in the SRS using EQI. Moreover, the results indicated that the average number of defects detected with EQI was greater than that of the classical review technique - perspective-based reading. Furthermore, the controlled experiment demonstrated that EQI provides a comparatively objective and accurate evaluation of the quality of the SRS and markedly diminishes the bias in understanding software requirements due to the ambiguity of natural language.

Keywords: SRS Review; Software engineering; Software quality; Software requirements.