Propagating Requirement Change into Software High Level Designs towards Resilient Software Evolution

Uncertain and incomplete requirements throughout the whole software life cycle contribute to volatility of the requirements. In a situation where the volatile requirement is changed to satisfy stakeholder needs, all the affected requirements and other impacted software artefacts (such as designs, codes, and tests) must be identified and changed accordingly. This paper introduces an approach to facilitate both engineers and users in propagating changes from requirements to the software high-level designs during software development and evolution. The two main pillars of this approach, namely product metamodel and process model are described in details. Firstly, the metamodel highlights on explicit conceptual model for volatile requirement and its characteristics. Next, the focus will be placed on the systematic process model specified using the SPEM that offers guidelines to perform the requirement change process. The applicability of the product metamodel and its elements are evaluated using the IFAMMS case study application.