A design for evidence - based soft research

ABSTRACT

Active research is being done in how to go from requirements to architecture. However, no studies have been attempted in this area despite a long history of empirical research in software engineering (SE). Our goal is to establish a framework for the transformation from requirements to architecture on the basis of a series of empirical studies. The first step is to collect evidence about practice in industry before designing relevant techniques, methods and tools. As part of this step, we use an interview-based multiple-case study with a carefully designed process of conducting the interviews and of preparing the data collected for analysis while preserving its integrity. In this paper, we describe the design of this multiple-case study, delineate the evidence trail, discuss validity issues, outline the data analysis focus, discuss meta issues on evidence-based SE particularly on combining and using evidence, describe triangulation approaches, and present two methods for accumulating evidence.

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INDEX TERMS

Primary Classification:
  D. Software
  D.2 SOFTWARE ENGINEERING
        D.2.11 Software Architectures
            Subjects: Domain-specific architectures

Additional Classification:
  D. Software
  D.2 SOFTWARE ENGINEERING
      D.2.2 Design Tools and Techniques

General Terms:
Design, Documentation, Management