Prototype of the evaluation framework for functional requirements of RE-tools

For a complex activity like requirement engineering (RE), a powerful tool support is clearly useful. However, the mainstream of RE practice relies on office tools rather than targeted RE-tools (e.g. DOORS, CaliberRM, and RequisitePro). One of the reasons for not using RE-tools remains the difficulty to assess them before acquiring to organisation. Only few approaches are followed with some limited software tool support. Nor the approaches neither the tools are targeted towards the RE-tool domain; therefore, their applications are time consuming and domain knowledge demanding. Furthermore, the existing RE-tool frameworks list only RE-tool requirements which in most cases are development-oriented, and not supported by the application for the RE-tool evaluation. This paper presents a prototype tool of the evaluation framework for functional requirements of the RE-tools. The framework application is performed according to the systematic guidelines of the RE-tool evaluation approach (R-TEA).