Requirements Management at NASA

Requirements have always been acknowledged as the backbone of any system. However, in many past development efforts, requirements were paid little heed. At NASA, in recent years, the hue and cry for project development has been “Faster, Better, Cheaper and Safer”. This has impacted the way we develop software; it has increased the risks to quality, safety and reliability. At NASA, the Software Assurance Technology Center (SATC) is working with projects to emphasize the criticality of requirements throughout development, not just in the initial phases. This emphasis is on requirements relationship to all aspects of quality, including reliability and safety. In this presentation, we will look at some of these relationships through the eyes of quality. About the Speaker Dr. Linda H. Rosenberg is the Chief Scientist for Software Assurance at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. She is also acting Division Chief of the Software Assurance Technology Office in the Office of Systems Safety and Mission Assurance. In these roles, she is responsible for identifying and developing new techniques and technologies to continually improve the quality and safety of NASA’s mission software. Dr. Rosenberg is recognized internationally as an expert in the areas of software reliability, requirements and metrics and sits on the IEEE program committees for these fields. Prior to coming to NASA, Dr. Rosenberg was a College professor. Dr. Rosenberg holds a Ph.D. in Computer Science, a Masters of Engineering Science, and a Bachelors in Mathematics. Proceedings of the Fifth International Symposium on Requirements Engineering (RE’01) 1090-705X/01 $10.00 © 2001 IEEE