Ans. Interviews: After receiving the problem statement from the customer, the first step is to arrange a meeting with the customer. During the meeting or interview, both the parties would like to understand each other. Normally specialized developers often called ‘requirement engineers’ interact with the customer. The objective of conducting an interview is to understand the customer’s expectation from the software. Both parties have different feelings, goals, opinions, vocabularies, understanding, but one thing in common, both want the project to be a success. With this is mind, requirement engineers normally arrange interviews. Requirements engineers must be open minded and should not approach the interview with pre-conceived notion about what is required. Interview may be open-ended or structured. In open ended interview there is no pre-set agenda. Context free questions may be asked to understand the problem and to have an overview of the situation. In structured interview, agenda of fairly open questions is prepared. Sometimes a proper questionnaire is designed for the interview. Interview, may be started with simple questions to set people at ease. After making atmosphere comfortable and calm, specific questions may be asked to understand the requirements, The customer may be allowed to voice his or her perception about a possible solution.
Facilitated Application Specification Technique
A team oriented approach is developed for requirements gathering and is called facilitated application specification Techniques (FAST This approach encourages the creation of a joint team of customers and developers who work together to understand the expectations and propose of set of requirements. The basic guidelines of FAST are given below :
• Arrange a meeting at a neutral site for developers and customers.
• Establishment of rules for preparation and participation.
• Prepare and informal agenda that encourages free flow of ideas.
• Appoint a facilitator to control the meeting. A facilitator may be a
developer, a customer, or an outside expert. Prepare a definition
mechanism-Board, flip chart, worksheets, wall stickiest, etc.
• Participants should not criticize or debate.