Customisation of enterprise software using the RE4SA model

Abstract

Most failed software projects can be traced to bad requirements management. For enterprise software requirements management comes with additional challenges, there are many different users with their own requirements, and the software is often customised which causes additional issues during upgrades. Additionally, the software is often rather large as it encompasses a high number of business functions. In this research we apply the Requirements Engineering for Software Architecture (RE4SA) model to a multi-case study to investigate its uses in the customisation of enterprise software. The model allows us to improve the requirement management by improving the goal focus, and linking the requirements directly to the solutions in the software architecture. Achieving this alignment between requirements and software architecture allows us to bring the software architecture to a higher level, provide a clear overview of the software product and identify customer specific alterations.