Collaborative traceability management: a multiple case study from the perspectives of organization, process, and culture

作     者：Wohlrab, Rebekka Knauss, Eric Steghofer, Jan-Philipp Maro, Salome Anjorin, Anthony Pelliccione, Patrizio 

作者机构：Chalmers Univ Technol Gothenburg Sweden Univ Gothenburg Gothenburg Sweden Systemite AB Gothenburg Sweden Paderborn Univ Paderborn Germany Univ Aquila Laquila Italy 

出 版 物：《REQUIREMENTS ENGINEERING》 (需求工程)

年 卷 期：2020年第25卷第1期

页      面：21-45页

核心收录：

学科分类：0711[理学-系统科学] 07[理学] 08[工学] 070105[理学-运筹学与控制论] 0835[工学-软件工程] 081101[工学-控制理论与控制工程] 0701[理学-数学] 071101[理学-系统理论] 0811[工学-控制科学与工程] 0812[工学-计算机科学与技术（可授工学、理学学位）] 

基　　金：Wallenberg AI, Autonomous Systems and Software Program (WASP) - Knut and Alice Wallenberg Foundation Vinnova [2014-01271, 2014-05599, 2015-04881] Vinnova [2015-04881, 2014-05599, 2014-01271] Funding Source: Vinnova Swedish Research Council [2014-05599] Funding Source: Swedish Research Council 

主　　题：Traceability management Collaboration Software development processes Multiple case study 

摘      要：Traceability is crucial for many activities in software and systems engineering including monitoring the development progress, and proving compliance with standards. In practice, the use and maintenance of trace links are challenging as artifacts undergo constant change, and development takes place in distributed scenarios with multiple collaborating stakeholders. Although traceability management in general has been addressed in previous studies, there is a need for empirical insights into the collaborative aspects of traceability management and how it is situated in existing development contexts. The study reported in this paper aims to close this gap by investigating the relation of collaboration and traceability management, based on an understanding of characteristics of the development effort. In our multiple exploratory case study, we conducted semi-structured interviews with 24 individuals from 15 industrial projects. We explored which challenges arise, how traceability management can support collaboration, how collaboration relates to traceability management approaches, and what characteristics of the development effort influence traceability management and collaboration. We found that practitioners struggle with the following challenges: (1) collaboration across team and tool boundaries, (2) conveying the benefits of traceability, and (3) traceability maintenance. If these challenges are addressed, we found that traceability can facilitate communication and knowledge management in distributed contexts. Moreover, there exist multiple approaches to traceability management with diverse collaboration approaches, i.e., requirements-centered, developer-driven, and mixed approaches. While traceability can be leveraged in software development with both agile and plan-driven paradigms, a certain level of rigor is needed to realize its benefits and overcome challenges. To support practitioners, we provide principles of collaborative traceability management. The main c