Software reverse engineering is the process of recovering the design and the requirements specification of a product from an analysis of its code. Understand and plan for the support and maintenance requirements of information management systems. Hardware maintenance and development plan for the emd. It includes new features, new user requirements for refining the software and improve its reliability and performance. Successful documentation will make information easily accessible, provide a li. Emd task 101 statement of work for ecs sdps maintenance 4234602 contract data requirements document for emd task 101 ecs sdps maintenance 4234102 ecs functional and performance requirements specification. If possible, the documentation should be focused into the various components that make up an application. It has a list of all the requirements of the system as well as an analysis of viability of the requirements. A good project plan is imperative to the successful release of highquality software to the market. The presence of documentation helps keep track of all aspects of an application and it improves on the quality of a software product. Whats the best way to write a software maintenance plan. Technical documentation challenges in aviation maintenance. An effective requirements document will communicate the problem to be solved, who needs it solved, and why.
Before government service, paula spent four years as a senior software engineer at loral aerosys responsible for software requirements on the hubble telescope data archive. Documents requiring maintenance different documents require different levels of maintenance. The svs is a document that is essential for software application management and control. Perfective maintenance this includes modifications and updates done in order to keep the software usable over long period of time.
Studies show that software maintenance is, by far, the predominant activity in software engineering 90% of the total cost of a typical software 15,19. A software requirements document also called software requirements specifications is a document or set of documentation that outlines the features and intended behavior of a software application. Some requirements may only outline the highlevel needs of stakeholders while others articulate capabilities, characteristics, or functions. Software maintenance and support plan cern document server. Four general types of maintenance philosophies can be identified, namely corrective, preventive, riskbased and conditionbased maintenance.
It is written for personnel who are responsible for the maintenance of the system and who need to understand the operating environment, security, and control requirements. Most other documents focus on planning, development or testing. Did you ever get the feeling that you were writing a lot of documentation that noone was ever going to need later. This document presents the fundamental principles that will guide the software maintenance and the user support tasks within the project. Most of the times, the project managers and stakeholders focus on planning for the development and implementation phase of the project. The maintenance manual presents information on the system. Software maintenance is an integral part of the development cycle of a program. This study investigated the requirement for documentation during the maintenance phase of the software life cycle. This perception is perpetuated by users submitting. It emphasizes the importunateness of proper documentation. The parent documents reflect the documents from which the hardware maintenance and development plans scope and content are derived. Software maintenance is traditionally defined as any modification made on a software system after its delivery. Software maintenance plans are different than other technical documents in that the focus is on how to modify software after it has been released and is now in operations. System documentation provides an overview of the system and helps engineers and stakeholders understand the underlying technology.
Documents that are produced one time for a particular purpose do not require any maintenance, e. Preventive maintenance this includes modifications and updations to prevent future problems. Software maintenance an overview bcs the chartered. Documentation requirements for software maintenance.
Software products change due to corrective and noncorrective software actions. In the design stage, all current system and project documentation, existing software and databases, and the. Reverse engineering is becoming important, since several existing software products, lack proper documentation, are highly unstructured, or their structure has degraded through a series of. Software maintenance and support plan cern document. Its also helpful for development, maintenance, and knowledge transfer to other developers. Software engineering has been striving for years to improve the practice of software development and maintenance. It is a documentation of actual programming components like algorithms, flowcharts, program codes, functional modules, etc.
I think a user interface has requirements in both categories. To ensure that the supporting documentation for the software is uptodate. Documentation has long been prominent on the list of recommended practices to. The software maintenance task is responsible to coordinate the continuous maintenance of the middleware components developed within the project and included in an emi distribution, preserving. It comprises documentation updating, code optimization, and code restructuring. It is used throughout development to communicate how the software functions or how it is intended to operate. For a programmer reliable documentation is always a must. Ive never seen a requirements document limited to functions and constraints only, but i can see some value in having a structure like this it forces the writer to categorize the requirements into things the software needs to do, and rules the software needs to follow. It identifies common documentation problems that can lead to maintenance errors.
Software maintenance an overview sciencedirect topics. Preventive maintenance involves performing activities to prevent the occurrence of errors. Describes methods, procedures and practices determined to be acceptable for showing compliance with the general aviation maintenance recordmaking and recordkeeping requirements of title 14 of the code of federal regulations 14 cfr parts 43 and 91. The importance of documentation in software development. Why is documentation extremely important for developers. In other words, the software requirements document srd describes the business or organizations understanding of the end users typically the. Without proper documentation, maintenance personnel are not able to effectively understand the design of a software system and spend many hours performing design recovery before any type of maintenance can be performed. In addition to desired software performance, compatibility, or other technical considerations, needs determinations should consider such factors as multiple site or shared use requirements, whether the governments software maintenance philosophy will require the right to modify or have third parties modify the software, and any special.
Pdf maintenance of technical and user documentation. Yet the software maintenance task is the most expensive part of the life cycle foster 1993. The document in this file is an annotated outline for specifying software requirements, adapted from the ieee guide to software requirements specifications std 8301993. Maintenance is needed to ensure that the software continues to satisfy user requirements.
The more complex the software, the more maintenance it will likely need to ensure continued use. Software engineering software maintenance geeksforgeeks. It tends to reduce the software complexity thereby improving program understandability and increasing software maintainability. At the 2012 workshop, one attendee noted it is known that the technical documentation challenge is the greatest risk in the. The following are some areas in which documentation is especially valuable for a developer and some of my thoughts on what should be included. Maintenance systems and documentation is the third of three companion books covering material which has been developed and updated from my 1997 publications maintenance strategy and maintenance organization and systems, which were subsequently expanded and converted into distancelearning units which comprised the. They miss out on planning for the most important aspect postimplementation i. Tailor this to your needs, removing explanatory comments as you go along. It is also used as an agreement or as the foundation for agreement on what the software will do. Csta workshop on maintenance human factors issues, in 2010, identified technical documentation as the number one human factors challenge in aviation maintenance johnson, 2010. Ieee standard for software maintenance ieee std 12191998.
Its possible to minimize maintenance costs through intelligent planning and execution, but its also possible. Maintenance is needed to ensure that the system continues to satisfy user requirements. Where you decide to omit a section, keep the header, but insert a comment saying why you omit the data. However, one study indicated that over 80% of maintenance effort is used for noncorrective actions. Requirements documentation is the description of what a particular software does or shall do. Business systems written 1520 years ago are still in service and have undergone many generations of changes. Maintenance is applicable to software that is developed using any software life cycle model for example, spiral or linear. Method for all modules affected by a service request.
Software maintenance in software engineering is the modification of a software product after delivery to correct faults, to improve performance or other attributes a common perception of maintenance is that it merely involves fixing defects. Industrial studies suggest a consistent order of importance for information sources during software maintenance, and documentation is way down the list. Equipment records page 1 of 6 sections in this document. Typically software maintenance fees are a small percentage of. Poor maintenance documentation can be a precursor to aircraft incidents or accidents. Glossary of computer system software development terminology 895. Put simply, software maintenance is the process where software vendors provide updates, modifications, bug fixes, patches and additional features to existing software solutions to increase performance.
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