TY - JOUR
T1 - A knowledge based component/service repository to enhance analysts' domain knowledge for requirements analysis
AU - Vitharana, Padmal
AU - Jain, Hemant
AU - Zahedi, Fatemeh
N1 - Funding Information:
The authors thank Information & Management Editor-in-Chief Edgar Sibley and the review team for guidance through the review process. This research was partly funded by grants from the Earl V. Snyder Innovation Management Center at the Whitman School of Management, Syracuse University. The authors would also like to thank the multinational consulting company for their support during this research.
PY - 2012/1
Y1 - 2012/1
N2 - Knowledge of the business domain (e.g., insurance claim, human resources) is crucial to analysts' ability to conduct good requirements analysis (RA). However, current practices afford little assistance to analysts in acquiring domain knowledge. We argue that traditional reuse repositories could be augmented by adding rich faceted information on component/services and artifacts such as business-process templates to help analysts acquire domain knowledge during RA. In this paper, we present the design of a Knowledge Based Component Repository (KBCR) for facilitating RA. Then, we report on the design and development of a KBCR prototype. We illustrate its application in a system that is populated with components and process templates for the auto insurance claim domain. An empirical study was conducted to assess its effectiveness in improving RA. Results showed that KBCR enhanced analysts' business domain knowledge and helped them better prepare for RA. Our key research contribution is to offer analysts a rich repository (i.e., KBCR) containing domain knowledge that they could utilize to acquire domain knowledge that is crucial for carrying out RA. While repositories of reusable components have been employed for some time, no one has used such repositories to help analysts acquire domain knowledge in order improve the RA of the system.
AB - Knowledge of the business domain (e.g., insurance claim, human resources) is crucial to analysts' ability to conduct good requirements analysis (RA). However, current practices afford little assistance to analysts in acquiring domain knowledge. We argue that traditional reuse repositories could be augmented by adding rich faceted information on component/services and artifacts such as business-process templates to help analysts acquire domain knowledge during RA. In this paper, we present the design of a Knowledge Based Component Repository (KBCR) for facilitating RA. Then, we report on the design and development of a KBCR prototype. We illustrate its application in a system that is populated with components and process templates for the auto insurance claim domain. An empirical study was conducted to assess its effectiveness in improving RA. Results showed that KBCR enhanced analysts' business domain knowledge and helped them better prepare for RA. Our key research contribution is to offer analysts a rich repository (i.e., KBCR) containing domain knowledge that they could utilize to acquire domain knowledge that is crucial for carrying out RA. While repositories of reusable components have been employed for some time, no one has used such repositories to help analysts acquire domain knowledge in order improve the RA of the system.
KW - Component-based development
KW - Design research
KW - Domain knowledge
KW - Requirements analysis
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84856083160&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=84856083160&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.im.2011.12.004
DO - 10.1016/j.im.2011.12.004
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84856083160
SN - 0378-7206
VL - 49
SP - 24
EP - 35
JO - Information and Management
JF - Information and Management
IS - 1
ER -