Scenario usage in system development: a report on current practice

Summary form only given. Scenario-based approaches are attracting more and more interest in requirements engineering research and practice. The research literature offers an increasing number of scenario-related methods, models and notations which highlight the consideration of concrete system descriptions from a usage-oriented perspective, prior to abstract conceptual modelling of function, data and behavior. Scenario use is also becoming a pervasive phenomenon in industrial practice, but comprehensive and expressive studies on the practical relevance of the techniques proposed by research are still rare. The European ESPRIT project CREWS (Cooperative Requirements Engineering With Scenarios) aims at a deeper understanding of the diversity of scenarios, in order to help improve methodological and tool support for scenario-based requirements engineering. The authors consider the two-pronged strategy being followed to gain this understanding.