Software Requirements and Specification
(CS445 / CS645 / ECE451 / SE463)

Welcome to the home page for CS445/CS645/ECE451/SE463 -- Software Requirements and Specification.

This is one of three courses developed for the Software Engineering Option that is offered by the David R. Cheriton School of Computer Science and the Software Engineering degree program that is offered jointly by the David R. Cheriton School of Computer Science and the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering.

1. ECE451/CS445/SE463: Software Requirements and Specification (i.e., this course) 
2. ECE452/CS446/SE464: Software Design and Architecture.
3. ECE453/CS447/SE465: Software Testing, Quality Assurance, and Maintenance.

These courses examine state-of-the-art and state-of-the-practice software development techniques. These techniques can be used in the independently offered project courses SE390, SE490, and SE492.

This particular course is about the earliest tasks that are performed when developing a new software system:

• determining what software to build,
• specifying the software requirements precisely, concisely, and unambiguously, and
  
• ensuring that the documented requirements are correct
  

The syllabus for this course was changed recently. Among the biggest changes was to remove the long-term project --- to specify, build, test, and enhance a VoIP system and its MIS --- from the three courses so that

• each course stands alone
• no course is preceived as serving a project

Moreover, until this course has been taught a few times, it will be undergoing changes, sometimes in midstream, albeit with decreasing radicality with each succeeding term from the Fall of 2008.

• the current offering of this course (Fall 2009)
• the most recent ConGESE offering of this course (Winter 2008)
• the most recently completed offering of this course (Fall 2008)