ANOVA Based Significance Testing of Non-functional Requirements in Software Engineering

Abstract

Non-functional requirements (NFRs) demonstrate how the software system works, though functional requirements represent the tasks of the system (software system). It does not indicate that the latter is more significant, but a majority of requirement collecting approaches emphasis on functional requirements. Therefore, due to the subjective nature and complexity of NFRs, it is relatively impractical to focus on each NFRs. The primary objective of this article is to model NFRs in the form of a Soft Goal Interdependency Digraph (SID). The SID is based on the Interpretive Structural Modeling (ISM) technique which in turn employs the Matrices Impacts Cruise's Multiplication Applique a UN Casement (MICMAC) and Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) techniques for the identification of significant NFRs. Therefore, the proposed method allows the analysts and developers to monitor and select best possible trade off selections between NFRs. To evaluate the significance of the proposed technique over others, Analysis of variance (ANOVA) based significance testing is also implemented.