Michał Wolski tormigo.modesto.pl

1

Requirements management in Enterprise Architect using Google Docs

Group work in the cloud is a very convenient solution. Anyone who has tried to write the text with another person at the same time in applications such as Google Docs knows how effective and valuable these solutions are. Thanks to products such as the aforesaid Google Docs, the group work gained another dimension. It seems to be purposeful to move the benefits from the teamwork in the cloud into the world of requirements engineering. In the present text, I will try to present how to manage requirements collected in Enterprise Architect using Google Docs spreadsheet. Many people take part in the process of gathering requirements. They are often people from different departments of the company, branches, and even from different continents. Solutions used so far, are based primarily on the work with files saved locally and sent by e-mail. Such a solution required manual synchronization of records. Of course you can work in groups on the requirements repository using Enterprise Architect. It may, however, happen that the requirements will be determined by people who are not familiar with EA or have no access to it. In such a case TORMIGO (GDOCS module) and Google Docs spreadsheets comes to the aid. Tormigo Gdocs allows you to synchronize the EA project requirements repository with Google Docs spreadsheet. In order to start the process of synchronization you should select Google Docs from Tormigo application menu and enter basic data (Fig. 1)

Tormigo allows you to save the login and password in encrypted form. When there is no file with the name entered in Document Name field, Tormigo creates such a document (Fig. 2):

Fig. 1: Basic Tormigo - Google Docs window

Michał Wolski tormigo.modesto.pl

2

Next, after clicking Sync with Google Docs button, Tormigo synchronizes the data. Should the requirement be not found either in the spreadsheet or in the project repository, Tormigo displays an appropriate dialog box, which allows the user to make an appropriate decision (Fig. 3)

Selecting the “Mark as Deleted” button changes the requirement stereotype into Deleted in Google Docs or Deleted in project repository. In this way, a requirement deleted in one of them does not result in total and irreversible deletion of data. Important is the fact that in the case when the inconsistencies between the requirements arise during synchronization, the user may select currently appropriate variant of the requirement content along with its attributes (Fig. 5). Inconsistencies are marked red. What is more, after each sycnchronization an appropriate summary is displayed (Fig. 4)

Fig. 2: Document with requirements in Google Docs

Fig. 3: Dialog box for the purposes of new requirements management

Fig. 4: Summary after the sycnchronization

Michał Wolski tormigo.modesto.pl

3

Fig. 5: Manual selection of appropriate requirement content

Michał Wolski tormigo.modesto.pl

4

It should also be noted that all changes that have arisen in the Google Docs spreadsheet either as a result of using TORMIGO or as a result of manual editing of the file are saved and you can return to the previous version at any moment (Fig. 6). Moreover, Google Docs spreadsheet marks changes made by all persons to whom the given document has been made available. The spreadsheet may be made availabe to any number of persons and the sycnhronization works both on Google Apps accounts and traditional accounts. At the end, it should be noted that the use of Google Docs has one more advantage. Namely, changes may be monitored and alerts on their occurrence may be sent by e-mail to defined persons. Summing up, the use of Tormigo Google Docs allows for:

• two-way synchronization of requirements saved in Enterprise Architect project repository and requirements saved in Google Docs spreadsheet.

• the possibility to work on requirements in the cloud

• making the backup of the current version of requirements in the spreadsheet

• monitoring changes and send information by e-mail to defined persons You can test Tormigo free of charge for 30 days from: http://tormigo.modesto.pl/

Fig. 6: Automatic versioning of requirements in Google Docs