TITLE:
Icons: Visual Representation to Enrich Requirements Engineering Work
AUTHORS:
Sukanya Khanom, Anneli Heimbürger, Tommi Kärkkäinen
KEYWORDS:
Requirements Engineering; Icon; Culture; Stakeholder; Visual Language
JOURNAL NAME:
Journal of Software Engineering and Applications,
Vol.6 No.11,
November
25,
2013
ABSTRACT: Adapting icons in requirements
engineering can support the multifaceted needs of stakeholders. Conventional approaches
to RE are mainly highlighted in diagrams. This paper introduces icon-based
information as a way to represent ideas and concepts in the requirements
engineering domain. We report on icon artifacts that support requirements engineering
work such as priority types, status states and stakeholder kinds. We evaluate
how users interpret meanings of icons and the efficacy of icon prototypes
shaped to represent those requirements attributes. Our hypothesis is whether
practitioners can recognize the icons’ meaning in terms of their functional
representation. According to the empirical data from 45 participants, the
findings demonstrate the probability of providing users with icons and their
intended functions that correspond to RE artifacts in a novel yet effective
manner. Based on these findings, we suggest that icons could enrich
stakeholders’ perception of the RE process as a whole; however, meaningful
interpretation of an icon is subject to the user’s prior knowledge and
experience.