“Communication” Phase
Week 3
Agenda (Lecture)
• Web Engineering process
• “Communicate phase” or equivalentphase
• Web 1.0 and Web 2.0examples
WebE Process Activities & Actions
Chapter 4: Communication
• Understand the problem
before you begin to solve
it, and be sure that the
solution you conceive is
one that people really
want
• To do this, you’ll need to:
– Formulate
– Elicitate
– Negotiate
Formulation
• Focuses on defining the project needs and scope
– begins with the identification of a business need
– moves into a description of WebApp objectives
– defines major WebApp features, and establishes a basis for the
elicitation action that follows.
– allows stakeholders and the WebE team to establish a common
set of goals and objectives for the creation of each WebApp
increment
– identifies the scope of the development effort and provides a
means for determining a successfuloutcome
What Questions Do WeAsk?
• What is the main motivation (business need) for the
WebApp?
• What are the objectives that the WebApp must
fulfill?
• Who will use theWebApp?
Elicitation
• The intent is to gather detailed requirement collaboratively with all
stakeholders
• To do this:
– A meeting (either physical or virtual) is conducted and attended
by all stakeholders.
– Rules for preparation and participation are established.
– An agenda is suggested that is formal enough to cover all
important points but informal enough to encourage the free
flow of ideas.
– A facilitator (can be a customer, a Web engineer, or an outsider)
controls the meeting.
– A definition mechanism (can be work sheets, flip charts, or wall
stickers or an electronic bulletin board, chat room, or virtual
forum) is used.
Elicitation Tasks
• Define user categories, and develop descriptions for
each category.
• Define content and functionality using the lists each
person prepared.
• Consider specific constraints and performance
issues.
• Write user scenarios for each user class.
User Descriptions
• What is the user’s overall objective when using
the WebApp?
• What is the user’s background and sophistication
level relative to the content and functionality of
the WebApp?
• How will the user arrive at the WebApp?
• What generic WebApp characteristics does the
user like and dislike?
Content and Functionality
• Each stakeholder has begun this work by preparing lists of
content objects and WebAppfunctions.
• Once the meeting begins these lists can be:
– displayed on large sheets of paper pinned to the walls of the room
– displayed onadhesive‐backed sheets stuck to the walls, or
– written on awhiteboard.
– posted on an electronic bulletin board, at an internal website, or
posted in a chat room environment for review prior to the meeting.
• Ideally, each listed entry should be capable of being
manipulated separately so that lists can be combined, entries
can be deleted, and additions can be made. At this stage,
critique and debate are strictlyprohibited.
Constraints and Performance
• Internal constraints are best understood by
thinking about the technical environment in which
the WebApp will reside and the project
environment in which the WebApp will bebuilt.
– technical environment—specialized database protocols, the vagaries
of different Web browsers, operating system characteristics, and
client‐ server issues
– project environment—available WebE tools, development
hardware, software standards, and staff skill levels with various
WebE technologies.
Constraints and Performance
• External constraints can be enumerated by
considering the business and usage environment for
the WebApp.
– Business rules, end‐user idiosyncrasies, security demands, privacy
issues, run‐time performance, interoperability requirements, legal
restrictions, and government regulations are but a few of possible
external constraints
Capturing Interaction: UseCases
• Use cases describe how a specific user category (called an actor) will
interact with the WebApp to accomplish a specific action.
• Use cases are developed iteratively. Only those use cases necessary for the
increment to be built are developed during the communication activity for
the increment.
• Use cases enable youto:
• provide the detail necessary for effective planning and modeling activities.
• help you to understand how users perceive their interaction with the WebApp.
• help to compartmentalize Web engineering work because they can be organized
into WebApp increments.
• provide important guidance for those who must test the WebApp.
From Use Cases to Increments
• A stack of “cards” that contains one usage scenario or use case per card
– Each card contains the name of the use case, a brief description, and an effort
indicator—usually a number between 1 and 4
• The cards are:
– shuffled into random order
– distributed to selected stakeholders who are asked to arrange the cards into
groupings that reflect how they would like content and functionality (implied
by the usage scenarios) to bedelivered
• The manner in which cards are grouped is constrained by an effort
maximum M.
– No grouping of cards can have a cumulative effort indicator value that is
greater than M, where M is defined by the WebE team and is a function of
available resources and the desired delivery time for each increment.
Negotiation
• Ideally, requirements are defined in sufficient detail to
proceed
• BUT, in reality, requirements are often contradictory or
infeasible (within the context of real‐world constraints,
such as cost ortime).
• Negotiation involves working with the stakeholders to
balance functionality, performance, and other productor
system characteristics against cost and deliverytime.
• The best negotiators strive for a win‐win result.
– it’s a good idea to determine each of the stakeholders’ “win
conditions”.
Negotiation
• Recognize that it’s not a competition. To be successful,
both parties have to feel they’ve won or achieved
something. Both will have to compromise.
• Map out a strategy. Decide what you’d like to achieve,
what the other party wants to achieve, and how you’ll go
about making both happen.
• Listen actively. Don’t work on formulating your response
while the other party is talking. Listen. It’s likely you’ll
gain knowledge that will help you to better negotiate your
position.
Negotiation
• Focus on the other party’s interests. Don’t take hard
positions if you want to avoid conflict.
• Don’t let it get personal. Focus on the problem that
needs to be solved.
• Be creative. Don’t be afraid to think outside of the box if
you’re at an impasse.
• Be ready to commit. Once an agreement has been
reached, don’t waffle; commit to it and move on.