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When (if ever) Is a Claim Objective?

When (if ever) Is a Claim Objective?

“Objective”, as in, for example, “what I’m saying is objective”, or “that statement is objective”, or “we need objective criteria when making these decisions”, is a complicated term. It takes a lot of effort to make sure it is understood as intended (or closely enough). It is therefore a costly word to use. Why is…

Revisiting the Core Ontology and Problem in Requirements Engineering

In their seminal paper in the ACM Transactions on Software Engineering and Methodology, Zave and Jackson established a core ontology for Requirements Engineering (RE) and used it to formulate the “requirements problem”, thereby defining what it means to successfully complete RE. Given that stakeholders of the system-to-be communicate the information needed to perform RE, we…

Requirements Engineering for Self-Adaptive Systems: Core Ontology and Problem Statement

The vision for self-adaptive systems (SAS) is that they should continuously adapt their behavior at runtime in response to changing user’s requirements, operating contexts, and resource availability. Realizing this vision requires that we understand precisely how the various steps in the engineering of SAS depart from the established body of knowledge in information systems engineering….

Achieving, Satisficing, and Excelling

Definitions of the concepts derived from the goal concept (including functional and nonfunctional goal, hardgoal, and softgoal) used in requirements engineering are discussed, and precise (and, when appropriate, mathematical) definitions are suggested. The concept of satisficing, associated to softgoals is revisited. A softgoal is satisficed when thresholds of some precise criteria are reached. Satisficing does…

Critical Decision Concept in the Algorithmic Accountability Act

Critical Decision Concept in the Algorithmic Accountability Act

The Algorithmic Accountability Act of 2022, here, applies to systems that help make, or themselves make (or recommend) “critical decisions”.  Determining if something is a “critical decision” determines if a system is subject to the Act or not. Hence the interest in the discussion, below, of the definition of “critical decision”. The Act defines a…