Research Of Software Requirements Validation Procedure Based On Conceptualization Of Mental Models And Implementation Of Tools

Along with the development of software industry, the scale and complexity of software system leaped and the hidden troubles caused by software crisis are much more. The research indicated that the most important factor that led to a good many problems is software requirement, not programming. Because the contents related with requirements were the most difficult part to control, such as requirement analysis, requirement validation and so on. Project risks which were called requirement risks brought by requirements will affect design, programming, test, maintenance and so on.Software organizations put forward a series of measures to resolve above-mentioned problem which resulted from software crisis. Davis researched how to identify and measure quality in a software requirement specification in 1997. X.Lu used pathfinder networks to analyze and categorize software requirements in 2000.And Kudikyal used pathfinder networks to reduce misunderstanding of software requirements by conceptualization of mental models in 2004.In order to improve the accuracy of software requirement, and reinforce comprehension of stakeholders for the requirements, the technology about pathfinder networks was introduced, and brought forward a requirement validation model based on cognitive science. Using this model we may construct the realistic system effectively, then we can evaluate this system quantificationally for identifying ambiguous, duplicate and misunderstood requirements. It will affect the end product in terms of decreasing the number of defects in design and code, increase customer satisfaction, lower costs, and shorten development time. The experiments have confirmed the validity and utility of PFNET technology which is used in requirements analysis phase.We developed a web-based automatically validated tool to help stakeholders to validate requirements. We can use this tool to collect data, build network and make report for the whole process. The design structure of B/S which is the same with development mode of multi-organization and multi-team avoid space restriction among organizations and reduce some kinds of spending greatly.