Artifacts > Requirements Artifact Set > Supplementary Specifications


Supplementary Specifications
The Supplementary Specifications capture the system requirements that are not readily captured in the use cases of the use-case model. Such requirements include:
  • Legal and regulatory requirements and application standards.
  • Quality attributes of the system to be built, including usability, reliability, performance and supportability requirements.
  • Other requirements such as operating systems and environments, compatibility requirements, and design constraints.
Role: System Analyst
Enclosed in: Software Requirements Specification
Template:
Examples:
More Information:

Input to Activities: Output from Activities:

Purpose To top of page

The following roles and role sets use the Supplementary Specifications:

  • Analysts create and maintain the Supplementary Specifications, which serve as a communication medium between the analyst, the customer, and developers.
  • Developers use the Supplementary Specifications as a reference when defining responsibilities, operations, and attributes on classes, and when adjusting classes to the implementation environment.
  • Implementers refer to the Supplementary Specifications for input when implementing classes.
  • Managers refer to the Supplementary Specifications for input when planning iterations.
  • Testers use the Supplementary Specifications to verify system compliance.

Brief Outline To top of page

(hyperlinks into HTML template in a new window)

1.       Introduction         
    1.1     Purpose     
    1.2     Scope     
    1.3     Definitions, Acronyms and Abbreviations     
    1.4     References     
    1.5     Overview     
2.       Functionality     
    2.1     <Functional Requirement One>     
3.       Usability
    3.1     <Usability Requirement One>     
4.       Reliability
    4.1     <Reliability Requirement One>     
5.       Performance       
    5.1     <Performance Requirement One>     
6.       Supportability    
    6.1     <Supportability Requirement One>     
7.       Design Constraints   
    7.1     <Design Constraint One>     
8.       Online User Documentation and Help System Requirements
9.       Purchased Components 
10.            Interfaces               
    10.1     User Interfaces     
    10.2     Hardware Interfaces     
    10.3     Software Interfaces     
    10.4     Communications Interfaces     
11.            Licensing Requirements               
12.            Legal, Copyright and Other Notices               
13.            Applicable Standards               

Timing To top of page

Supplementary Specifications go hand-in-hand with the use-case model, implying that:

  • They are initially considered in the inception phase, as a complement to defining the scope of the system.
  • They are refined in an incremental fashion during the elaboration and construction phases.

Responsibility To top of page

A system analyst is responsible for producing the Supplementary Specifications, which is an important complement to the use-case model. The Supplementary Specifications and the use-case model should together capture a complete set of requirements on the system.

Tailoring To top of page

The kinds of supplementary requirements vary widely between projects, so tailoring should be applied to define sections applicable to your project.  Decide which information (attributes) to include in the Vision, and which to manage using requirements management tools, such as Rational RequisitePro (see Tool Mentor: Managing Dependencies using Rational RequisitePro®), and see Artifact: Requirements Attributes).



Copyright  © 1987 - 2001 Rational Software Corporation

Display Rational Unified Process using frames

Rational Unified Process