Software Requirement Specifications by Syndicode Share: Syndicode Date Published 18 November 2019 Categories Blog Reading Time 7-Minute Read When you start a new project, there are some things you need to decide in the first place. The software requirement specification is one of them. During the process of the discovery session, we need to estimate the product. This process usually is based on the text document written in any text editor, that describes the essential correlations happening in the future product. As a custom software development company from Ukraine, over the years, Syndicode’s team developed their own requirement specifications that you can find below. What Is a Software Requirement Specification? A software requirements specification (SRS) is a detailed description of a software system that needs to be developed. There are functional and non-functional requirements, like use cases and user interactions that the company must provide the client to ensure perfect interaction. This kind of specification creates the ground for an agreement between customers and suppliers on the software product’s function. The purpose of the description of the software requirements specification is to avoid future redesigning. It should contain really estimated product costs, risks, and schedules. This could help to prevent software project mistakes and ensure all necessary requirements are under control. To create this list of software requirements, the developer needs to have a clear understanding of the developed products. For this, the software development process needs to maintain continuous communications with the project team and customer. Using software requirement specifications helps to ensure requirements fulfilled. A typical SRS includes: A purpose General description Specific requirements Every company has its own software requirements list. Syndicode gathers our software requirements during the discovery session. This is the act of gathering key project information so you can gain a high-level understanding of the project. In most cases, this is done by getting the answers to specific questions. Parts of software requirement specification There are specific parts of the software requirement specification that exist in every description. Let’s look at how your outline could look like: Introduction Purpose Intended audience Intended use Scope Definitions and acronyms Overall description User needs Assumptions and dependencies System features and requirements Functional requirements External interface requirements System features Nonfunctional requirements External interface requirements Performance requirements Logical database requirement User interfaces Hardware interfaces Software interfaces Communications interfaces There is a set of guidelines that the company needs to follow during the creation process of the software requirement specification document. Here you have to write down the purpose, scope, functional and nonfunctional requirements, software and hardware requirements of the project. The description also can contain information about safety and security requirements, software quality attributes of the project and others. Functional and Non-Functional Requirements As we mentioned before there are functional and non-functional requirements. In general, the SRS should include such main elements of the description like the functional requirements, system requirements, technical requirements, and assumptions. We have some of them described in more detail. Functional requirements usually contain calculations, processing, technical details, data manipulation, and other functionality that has information about the accomplished parts of the system. The idea for implementing functional requirements finds its roots in the system design, while the non-functional requirements are described in the system architecture. Non-functional requirements support functional requirements that refer to the constraints or implementation of the system. The non-functional requirements include: Business model. Here you can find the description of the selected business model that the system supports. These are the questions of the organizational context, diagrams that show current and future states, main business functions, and process flow diagrams. Functional and system requirements. Here are mainly described organizational requirements with the detailed system requirements. Business and system use cases. Here you can put a diagram that can show the main external entities that will be interacting with the system. The business use cases are usually connected with the functional requirements and often linked to the system requirements. Technical requirements. This is one of the “non-functional” requirements that describe the technical environment that the product needs to operate in. System qualities. Here are usually listed the requirements that are responsible for the quality of the system. They can include such characteristics as maintainability, reliability, availability, serviceability, security, scalability. Constraints and assumptions. This is where you can list all possible constraints and assumptions. If some of them are false, the system requirements specification needs to be reestimated. Acceptance criteria. This refers to the end of the project. This criteria usually describes all user acceptance tests and all bugs. Software Requirement Specifications by Syndicode Syndicode has its own template of software specifications that we usually create during the estimation of the project. Here is the list of the requirements we usually use for our projects: Core matching data F1: Catalogue of competencies/skills – for admin – for providers – for users F2: List of impact levers for admin, users, and providers F3: List of topics – ability to manage topic options to users – ability to manage topics through admin panel – ability to manage topic options to providers F4: Rating/evaluation of courses – ability to manage course rating to admin – display rating on the course details page Provider structure, logins, and product catalog – Institutional page / branding – Product/course publication – Interaction – Enrollment lists / Acceptance of a course registration request – User structure on the provider side Features on the demand-side. Individuals looking for lifelong learning opportunities – Search-process – Display of search results and recommended courses – Bookmark, share, compare – Interaction with provider and alumni – Evaluation/rating of the course – User profile on the demand side EU-GDPR requirements and further items SEO and Landing pages (+ Google Analytics) Static pages Software Requirement Specifications Example As an online marketplace development agency, if we apply this template to some project that creates a platform for the marketplace open to the businesses part, it could look like this: General specifications & requirements Here are described fundamental characteristics of the platform Nomenclature Description of the main party owning, managing and administrating the marketplace Vendor functionalities 3.1. Describing a business 3.2. Products 3.3. Pricing & Conditions 3.4. Calendar (management of availabilities and unavailabilities). It is possible to set availabilities up to 12 months in advance. 3.5. Images (images can be added via operation of drag and drop in a zone provided for this purpose, or through an upload field allowing for multiple selections of images) 3.6. Categories (a system of categories allows the vendor to select one or more categories corresponding to his business) 3.7. Location (this tool allows the provider to enter the address where the service is offered or where the business is located) 3.8. Activating/deactivating a business (the vendor may deactivate a business at any time) User functionalities 4.1.Search engine (auto-geolocation for example) 4.2. Search results 4.3. The public view of businesses (frontend) Vendor features 5.1. Comments and ratings 5.2. User dashboard 5.3. Ratings and comments Payment Super administrator Control Panel Transactional emails (Variables available in the transactional emails) Email signatures Emails sent to all users Emails sent to the offers When the client comes with the idea, we have limited time to give out the estimation, and sometimes, the core functions which will take the most time to develop will be revealed only after the detailed discovery session. Sometimes the decisions on the technology do not come right away but need proper investigation and the potential use of innovations. So the final proposal might have different prices from what you’ve heard at the beginning. And this is normal as you’ll be informed about every decision and need. At least, we do so in Syndicode staying transparent about everything. When you hire Syndicode, we’ll provide you with an expert opinion on custom software development, software development outsourcing or out-staffing you need. Hire the best software developers in Ukraine!