An Empirical Study of Software Requirements Verification and Validation Techniques along their Mitigation Strategies

Requirements engineering is very crucial phase of software development cycle. Different sub activities are performed during requirements engineering. Previous research shows that there are various techniques regarding requirements verification and validation. These techniques can have different relative importance in different situation. Typically the requirements engineers don’t have proper knowledge regarding nature of each technique. Existing requirements validation & verification techniques differ in their ability to effectively cover the system requirements. It is highly desirable to conduct an empirical study on requirements verification and validation techniques to know their relative importance in opinion of different experts. In this study we developed a questionnaire based on requirements verification and validation techniques and their relative importance. Analysis of the results indicates that according to experts point of view (based on their experiences and judgments) ambiguous requirements are the biggest reason behind requirements verification and validation issues. Experts do believe that review and inspection are the best mitigation strategies to remove or minimize requirements verification and validation challenges.