Towards an Holistic Definition of Requirements Debt
This work addresses the lack of understanding in requirements engineering for software projects, but it is incremental as it builds on existing literature without presenting new empirical results.
The paper tackles the problem of applying the technical debt metaphor to requirements engineering by proposing a holistic definition that includes debt from identification, formalization, and implementation of requirements, aiming to support stakeholder decisions on managing this debt.
When not appropriately managed, technical debt is considered to have negative effects on the long term success of a software project. However, how the debt metaphor applies to requirements engineering in general, and to requirements engineering activities in particular, is not well understood. Grounded in the existing literature, we present a holistic definition of requirements debt which include debt incurred during the identification, formalization, and implementation of requirements. We outline future assessment to validate and further refine our proposed definition. This conceptualization is the first step towards a requirements debt monitoring framework to support stakeholders decisions, such as when to incur and eventually pay back requirements debt, and at what costs