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A framework to improve communication during the requirements elicitation process in GSD projects

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Abstract

Achieving a shared understanding of requirements is difficult in any situation, even more so in global software development projects. In such environments, people must deal not only with the lack of face to face communication, but also with other issues such as time difference, cultural diversity and a large amount of information originating from different sources throughout the world. Obtaining the right requirements therefore implies extra effort. In order to minimize such problems, we propose a framework that focuses on analyzing the factors that may be problematic in global software development and which suggests a set of strategies to improve the requirements elicitation process in such environments. In this paper, we describe the different phases of our framework and present the results of an experiment that test part of this framework. The results indicate that applying some of the strategies proposed in the framework seems to positively affect the stakeholders’ satisfaction with regard to communication. Moreover, the quality of the written software requirements specifications seems to be better as well when using those strategies.

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Notes

  1. Available on the www: http://www.engr.ncsu.edu/learningstyles/ilsweb.html.

  2. http://www.engr.ncsu.edu/learningstyles/ilsweb.html.

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Acknowledgments

This work has been funded by the PEGASO/MAGO project (Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación MICINN and Fondos FEDER, TIN2009-13718-C02-01). It is also supported by MEVALHE (HITO-09-126) and ENGLOBAS (PII2I09-0147-8235) projects, funded by Consejería de Educación y Ciencia (Junta de Comunidades de Castilla-La Mancha), and co-funded by Fondos FEDER, as well as the MELISA project (PAC08-0142-3315), Junta de Comunidades de Castilla-La Mancha, Consejería de Educación y Ciencia in Spain and also by the 04/E072 project from Universidad Nacional del Comahue, in Argentina.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. GIISCo Research Group, Faculty of Informatics, National University of Comahue, Neuquén, Argentina

    Gabriela N. Aranda

  2. ALARCOS Research Group, Information Systems and Technologies Department, UCLM-INDRA Research and Development Institute, University of Castilla-La Mancha, Ciudad Real, Spain

    Aurora Vizcaíno & Mario Piattini

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  1. Gabriela N. Aranda
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  3. Mario Piattini
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Correspondence to Gabriela N. Aranda.

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Aranda, G.N., Vizcaíno, A. & Piattini, M. A framework to improve communication during the requirements elicitation process in GSD projects. Requirements Eng 15, 397–417 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00766-010-0105-9

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