The Modification Process: a Practical Means to Understand and Enhance the Software Requirements Engineering Process

Software requirements elicitation is a difficult process with many existing problems, and no single elicitation method solves all these problems. We introduce a new way of looking at the requirements elicitation process. Our model shows the requirements elicitation problem as a process of merging the users’ wants and the users’ needs into the same entity. In the context of our model, existing processes can be enhanced to help ensure that the users’ wants and needs are both met. In doing so, we show that resulting requirements are more correct, complete, and feasible. Furthermore, using our model can help limit the solution to what the user truly needs, thus reducing unnecessary complexity.