Developers who gather software requirements before beginning the project can make use of many proposed systems – from Hewlett-Packard’s FURP S+ model or the one advanced by the IEEE. However, for a tester, these systems may not be of much use. Many companies in the software testing Dubai industry don’t give much of a thought regarding categorization of software requirements. A very few that actually do, categorize the requirements by the way they are going to be tested. 

Testers need only categorize them into 3.

• Implicit requirements
  
• Explicit requirements
  
• Latent requirements
  

Implicit requirements - Implicit requirements include those that directly tie to the customer’s expectations, and can include performance, usability, security etc. Users won’t expect their passwords to be stored in plain text, and may expect encryption and credentials-based access in most cases. Essentially, these are requirements that users would obviously expect from a product, and these requirements can also be ‘non-functional’. 

Explicit requirements - Explicit requirements include those that the client directly communicated to the team. It can be found in documents shared by the stakeholders to the development team, and can be derived from approved design specifications, acceptance criteria, or even from wireframes. It basically covers everything that the software is supposed to do according to the customer. 

Latent requirements - Latent requirements include those that the development team can add to further enhance the product and give customers a better experience. They can include product behavior that the clients typically don’t expect but would want to have in the product. 

An experienced software development company in Dubai would break down the requirements in a similar fashion to devise a testing strategy that can ensure a high quality product in time. Each category should be tested independently.

Testing implicit requirements

Identifying and reporting bugs for implicit requirements is quite tricky, because of the simple fact that they aren’t explicit requirements. To test implicit requirements the right way, the tester needs to be well versed in the problems of customers that the software is expected to solve, and the technology leveraged for the same in the software. 

If the software cannot match an implicit requirement, it should be reported in detail also stating why the customer would want the software to behave differently than what was reported. 

Testing explicit requirements

Testing explicit requirements of the product is almost always done while comparing the software to written documentation (where the client's requirements are detailed). The testers will have to do a few negative checks as well, while the developers personally verify explicit requirements.

If the product fails to match any explicit requirement, it’s wise to examine both the documentation and the software to determine which of the two needs to be changed. Ideally, the product should meet explicit requirements when it reaches the testing stage. This part would be much easier in an Agile ecosystem, where development and testing are done in sprints. 

Testing latent requirements

This requires the tester to be spontaneous, because until the tester gets his hands on the software product, it’s not possible to test latent requirements. Testers must have a deep understanding of customer preferences and how the software handles those preferences. Despite this understanding, the tester would still have to go at it from a tester’s perspective. This makes testing latent requirements the most challenging.

Every time the software fails to match a latent requirement or a scenario that can impress users according to the tester, it presents more opportunities to improve the software. This requires serious planning and close collaboration with the developers. Because it’s fraught with challenges, only experienced testing firms will normally allocate resources for testing latent requirements. 

Conclusion

Not all companies perform testing this way. The categorization principle mentioned above was derived from guidelines by many testing experts in Dubai, and is effective in streamlining software testing in organizations that haven’t completely adopted Agile. However, almost every leading IT solutions company Dubai would be following similar testing principles to guarantee a high quality product that users would appreciate.