Versions, Requirements and Sections in AppLife DNA

To effectively use AppLife DNA you must understand the relationships between versions, requirements, and sections. A short definition of each follows:

Version – Represents a software release, which implements a set of requirements.

Requirement – Represents an identified want or need that is essential to ensure a solution to a problem. In other words, something your software must accomplish.

Section – A discrete part or portion of a completed software specification. A section is where requirements are defined or described in greater detail. A section can describe one individual requirement or, more likely, include details of multiple requirements.

The first thing that you'll do with a new AppLife DNA project is add new requirements. The work you’ll perform in AppLife DNA is to organize and assign requirements to versions and then define each requirement in detail within sections.

When requirements are added they are not versioned and they are not defined in any section. You can add requirements using the New Requirement ribbon button. There are keyboard shortcuts for most actions in AppLife DNA though and a very useful one to remember is the Insert key. This shortcut key will add new requirements in either of the two requirement views. Another useful keyboard shortcut is to hold down the Alt key and press the Insert key. This will add a category. Using categories you can structure and organize your application requirements to logically match your application domain.

Requirements are expanded upon in detail within sections. This process is called defining a requirement. To define a requirement, select the requirement and choose the Define command from the ribbon. If the requirement has never been defined before, you are presented a dialog to choose the section in which to define the requirement. You can also create a new one. Once a section is created or selected, the section editor is displayed. On the left side of the section editor you see a list of sections. This list of sections displays the sections that are included in the current working version. A section is included in a version because it defines one or more of the version's requirements, or the section is flagged as a global section within it's properties dialog. A global section is always included in all versions. Sections can be arranged and indented from this panel. This arrangement is version specific.

To indicate that a requirement is to be included in a specific software version, the requirement is versioned. You can version one or more requirements by selecting the requirements in the grid and clicking the Version command in the ribbon. This action versions the selected requirements within the current working version. A Requirement’s version assignment can also be cleared. To re-assign a requirement to a different version, you would first clear the version and then re-version appropriately.

Now that we have our requirements versioned appropriately and defined within sections, we can generate a specification document. To generate a spec, navigate to the specifications ribbon tab and select the version of interest, then click the Create Specification ribbon command. When a spec is generated, all of the sections linked to the version being generated will be included in the generated document. Using specification generation options, you can append the requirements that are defined in each section to the section body. You can also include links between sections that define common requirements. Generated specifications can be saved and distributed in many formats, including MS Word.

AppLife DNA improves your specification authoring process by focusing your specification authoring activities on requirements. New requirements are assigned to a version and then defined in detail within sections. The relationships between requirements, versions, and sections are used to compile specifications documents that define a version’s requirements. These relationships are also used to append content that strengthens the resulting document’s capability to communicate the intent of the software version. In the next lab, we’ll cover inheritance and see how AppLife DNA allows you to continue adding and defining requirements for the next software version while still maintaining previous versions.

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