At our recent „Intland TechDay“, Alexander Bourgett, Manager Software Development at our customer S1nn GmbH, presented his working experiences with our brand new codeBeamer Requirements Management (cBRM) tool for development of automotive infotainment systems.
We appreciate to share S1nn’s experiences with you:
What were your reasons for implementing cBRM at your company?
S1nn GmbH is a Tier 1 automotive supplier with business segments in Audio, Connectivity and Engineering. Functionality of automotive infotainment is defined by customer requirements – that’s why an effective Requirements Management system is indispensable for our precise project development processes as
• the complete requirements package has significant impact on technical concepts to be considered,
• „neglecting“ of requirements might result in commerical risks or even in project failure / collapse,
• vague and missing requirements lead to higher risks if the need for additional functions arise at a later stage; this would finally result in higher costs and project delay.
Our constraints were a high software share that should be adjustable to Automotive SPICE, V-process and traceability. Consequently, we decided in favour of codeBeamer Requirements Management .
How did you manage your processes prior to introducing cBRM?
Our requirements definitions were administrated in files (PDF, Word, Excel…); performance and requirements specifications were kept manually in Excel documents, and also our work package planning. For configuration management we used a central repository, and for bug tracking a central ticket-tracking-system. Our first approach to convert the work package planning into a ticket-tracking-system was successfully executed for the stability phases (bug fixing); however, we did not apply this for the implementation phases as links to requirements within the systems were not established. Furtheron, traceability was revealed too complex outside the system.
Which improvements have you achieved so far by implementing cBRM?
We started with cBRM’s Beta-Release in January 2012, and so far we pursue a rather agile conversion, i.e. „what serves most, comes first“. Currently, not all codeBeamer functions within projects are yet exploited to their full extent, e.g. ‚old projects’ remain on the old platform. We initiated an operating guideline structure to
• set-up defined workflows to evaluate requirements and features
• import / export evaluated requirements
• generate updated document lists
• and linking requirements / features to work packages
Let me state some practical examples:
Workflow definition for requirements tracker ✔
We defined an evaluation cycle for requirements in which all essential conditions of performance and requirements specification processes are displayed. In addition, role-based transitions shall be enabled.
Requirements import from Excel, Word, XML, HTML ✔
CSV/Excel import by codeBeamer on-board tools is not used; imports are done by own adapter programmes that use codeBeamer Remote API via Java and Python:
• source data like Excel, Word, XML/HTML, PDF
• generating tracker items with source data content
• iterative performance and requirements specification processes with updates are enabled
Requirements Management per item view ✔
Displaying attributes to requirements.
Requirements Management per document view✔
Creating, arranging, selecting of requirements as well as revealing further information to each requirement/feature.
Feature Status Report – automatically generated ✔
Feature progress’ interchange between S1nn and our customers is a key element in progress tracking during implementation phases (contrary to bug tracking in stability phases). Within codeBeamer, the feature progress is always online available for internal purposes, whereas the export of current status is necessary for customers. Prior to codeBeamer, we had a high manually workload for tracking and reporting – today, our life is much easier with the automized status export in Excel via Remote-API.
Document lists – connecting to document management ✔
Customer information about new documents is reasonable when several customer departments deliver requirements separately.
Reports via documents (incl. versions) to Excel ✔
Attributes to documents in codeBeamer enable an extension of own documents versions. A selection of baselines for creation of document lists via remote-API would be appreciated.
Traceability – linking of requirements – DevTask ✔
Requirements refer to work package (DevTask). Directly visible in the requirements decscription, indicated with fulfillment degree.
What will be your next steps to exploit all codeBeamer functions?
For further progress in our customers projects we are planning to
• establish traceability between requirements and associated tests
• automatically generate Dev-Tasks of requirements and features after import
• integrate document generation in codeBeamer’s Wiki, to economize external applications for reporting
• transfer from Subversion to Git
• connection to DOORS, if required by customers
———–
If you consider to speed-up your projects with codeBeamer Requirements Management just contact us for further info.
We appreciate to share S1nn’s experiences with you:
What were your reasons for implementing cBRM at your company?
S1nn GmbH is a Tier 1 automotive supplier with business segments in Audio, Connectivity and Engineering. Functionality of automotive infotainment is defined by customer requirements – that’s why an effective Requirements Management system is indispensable for our precise project development processes as
• the complete requirements package has significant impact on technical concepts to be considered,
• „neglecting“ of requirements might result in commerical risks or even in project failure / collapse,
• vague and missing requirements lead to higher risks if the need for additional functions arise at a later stage; this would finally result in higher costs and project delay.
Our constraints were a high software share that should be adjustable to Automotive SPICE, V-process and traceability. Consequently, we decided in favour of codeBeamer Requirements Management .
How did you manage your processes prior to introducing cBRM?
Our requirements definitions were administrated in files (PDF, Word, Excel…); performance and requirements specifications were kept manually in Excel documents, and also our work package planning. For configuration management we used a central repository, and for bug tracking a central ticket-tracking-system. Our first approach to convert the work package planning into a ticket-tracking-system was successfully executed for the stability phases (bug fixing); however, we did not apply this for the implementation phases as links to requirements within the systems were not established. Furtheron, traceability was revealed too complex outside the system.
Which improvements have you achieved so far by implementing cBRM?
We started with cBRM’s Beta-Release in January 2012, and so far we pursue a rather agile conversion, i.e. „what serves most, comes first“. Currently, not all codeBeamer functions within projects are yet exploited to their full extent, e.g. ‚old projects’ remain on the old platform. We initiated an operating guideline structure to
• set-up defined workflows to evaluate requirements and features
• import / export evaluated requirements
• generate updated document lists
• and linking requirements / features to work packages
Let me state some practical examples:
Workflow definition for requirements tracker ✔
We defined an evaluation cycle for requirements in which all essential conditions of performance and requirements specification processes are displayed. In addition, role-based transitions shall be enabled.
Requirements import from Excel, Word, XML, HTML ✔
CSV/Excel import by codeBeamer on-board tools is not used; imports are done by own adapter programmes that use codeBeamer Remote API via Java and Python:
• source data like Excel, Word, XML/HTML, PDF
• generating tracker items with source data content
• iterative performance and requirements specification processes with updates are enabled
Requirements Management per item view ✔
Displaying attributes to requirements.
Requirements Management per document view✔
Creating, arranging, selecting of requirements as well as revealing further information to each requirement/feature.
Feature Status Report – automatically generated ✔
Feature progress’ interchange between S1nn and our customers is a key element in progress tracking during implementation phases (contrary to bug tracking in stability phases). Within codeBeamer, the feature progress is always online available for internal purposes, whereas the export of current status is necessary for customers. Prior to codeBeamer, we had a high manually workload for tracking and reporting – today, our life is much easier with the automized status export in Excel via Remote-API.
Document lists – connecting to document management ✔
Customer information about new documents is reasonable when several customer departments deliver requirements separately.
Reports via documents (incl. versions) to Excel ✔
Attributes to documents in codeBeamer enable an extension of own documents versions. A selection of baselines for creation of document lists via remote-API would be appreciated.
Traceability – linking of requirements – DevTask ✔
Requirements refer to work package (DevTask). Directly visible in the requirements decscription, indicated with fulfillment degree.
What will be your next steps to exploit all codeBeamer functions?
For further progress in our customers projects we are planning to
• establish traceability between requirements and associated tests
• automatically generate Dev-Tasks of requirements and features after import
• integrate document generation in codeBeamer’s Wiki, to economize external applications for reporting
• transfer from Subversion to Git
• connection to DOORS, if required by customers
———–
If you consider to speed-up your projects with codeBeamer Requirements Management just contact us for further info.
