Details of Requirements Baselining

Owned by Sanjay Sahani
Mar 11, 2014
1 min read

This feature provides support for requirements baseline and tracks changes made to all requirements.

Overview of Implementation

RMsis implements the Baseline as follows:

  1. General
    1. Baselines are named, and can be defined by the user.
  2. Baseline Indicator
    1. A base-lined entity is identified through an icon chosen for the purpose.
    2. A column is available to show icons indicating if an entity has one of the following states:
      1. Not Baselined
      2. Marked for Baseline
      3. Marked for Baseline and Changed
      4. Baselined
    3. The user has the option to show / hide this column.
  3. Requirements marked for baseline
    1. A user can iteratively do multiselect and "Mark for Baseline"
    2. A user can iteratively do multiselect and "UnMark for Baseline"
    3. When consensus has been achieved, user can "Create Baseline", which will include all requirements
      1. Marked for Baseline
      2. Marked for Baseline and changed
      3. Currently selected
    4. Before creating the baseline, system will inform the user about requirements which are
      1. Marked and changed.
      2. Not Marked and selected.
      3. Multiple versions of the same requirement
    5. User provides a Name and Description while creating the baseline.
  4. Requirements Baselining
    1. A base-lined Requirement signifies that there is agreement between all stakeholders at the time of base-lining.
    2. When base-lined, RMsis forces a version freeze for the Requirement.
    3. The users are not allowed to edit the Requirement after baselining. For making changes, a new version has to be explicitly created.
    4. Multiple baselines can be associated with one version of Requirement.
    5. If the Requirement changes, system will log the changes (maintains history).
  5. Baseline of entities managed by RMsis
    1. When a Requirement is base-lined, the links to current versions of all linked requirements will be saved.
    2. The users have to ensure that the associated documents cannot be modified.
    3. The versions of associated test cases is not managed by the system.
  6. Baseline of entities not managed by RMsis
    1. The versions of associated artifacts is not managed by the system.
  7. Baseline Reporting
    1. Comparison of baselines is available in the Reporting Tab from RMsis v.1.5.0 onwards. 
  8. Filters
    1. Used in conjunction with filters, we think that this offers a simple and usable solution to most of the RMsis users.
    2. For example by clicking on the "Export to PDF" icon, when the user is viewing the latest baseline, only the entities included in the current view will be exported.

Operations in the Requirements Hierarchy

  1. Baseline operations performed on a
    1. parent will have no impact on it's children.
    2. child will not affect the parent.
  2. Create Version of a Baselined Requirement
    1. This will effectively fork a new branch for the requirement..
  3. Delete
    1. A baselined requirement cannot be deleted.
  4. Move
    1. A baselined requirement can be moved under a different hierarchy.
    2. It is not possible to move a specific version of a requirement. All versions move simultaneously.
  5. Indent and Outdent
    1. It is not possible to indent a requirement below any committed requirement.

Overview of User Interface

Baseline drop-down in Planned Requirements

This presents multiple options to the users

  • Mark for Baseline
    • All the selected entities will be marked against the latest baseline.
  • UnMark
    • All the selected entities will be UnMarked against the latest baseline.
  • Create Baseline
    • The system will prompt for and save the Baseline Name & Description
    • All the Marked and selected requirements will be associated with the newly created baseline.
    • By default, the created baseline will be in uncommitted state. 

  • Link to Baseline:

    • All selected and marked requirements can be linked with an already existing non-committed baseline by selecting "Link to Baseline" option.

  • Unlink From Baseline: 

    • All selected requirements can be unlinked from a non-committed baseline by selecting "Unlink From Baseline" option.

  • Commit Baseline: 

    • The current state of the selected baseline will be saved after using the option "Commit Baseline". 

    • Requirements cannot be linked/ unlinked to a baseline after the baseline has been committed.

  • Uncommit Baseline: 

    • The selected baseline will be uncommitted after using the option "Uncommit Baseline". 

    • If a committed baseline has been uncommitted using this option, requirements can be linked/ unlinked to such baseline.

View Baseline drop-down in Planned Requirements

  • In the current implementation, only one version of an entity is displayed at any point of time.
  • Clicking on this button will show a scroll list displaying 10 (or MAX if < 10) with the latest baseline at the top.
  • Selecting an option will display the modified table.

Filter in the Baseline Column

  • No Option Selected
    • All requirements, irrespective of the baseline status will be displayed.
    • This is the default option.
  • Not Baselined
    • All requirements, which are not baselined will be displayed.
  • Baselined
    • All baselined requirements will be displayed.
  • Marked for Baseline
    • All requirements marked for baseline will be displayed
  • Marked and Changed
    • All requirements marked for baseline and modified after marking will be displayed.

Scope

This feature applies to all the entities directly managed within the RMsis system. The entities covered by Baseline feature are

  • Planned Requirements
  • Documents
  • References to other requirements maintained by Planned Requirements

In the future, the following entities are likely to be covered

  • Use Cases

Baseline feature excludes/does not cover

  • Unplanned Requirements
  • Administrative functions