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What can be done if requirements are changing continuously?
Software Quality Assurance Interview Questions and Answers
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142. What can be done if requirements are changing continuously?
A common problem and a major headache.
- Work with the project's stakeholders early on to understand how requirements might change so that alternate test plans and strategies can be worked out in advance, if possible.
- It's helpful if the application's initial design allows for some adaptability so that later changes do not require redoing the application from scratch.
- If the code is well-commented and well-documented this makes changes easier for the developers.
- Use rapid prototyping whenever possible to help customers feel sure of their requirements and minimize changes.
- The project's initial schedule should allow for some extra time commensurate with the possibility of changes.
- Try to move new requirements to a 'Phase 2' version of an application, while using the original requirements for the 'Phase 1' version.
- Negotiate to allow only easily-implemented new requirements into the project, while moving more difficult new requirements into future versions of the application.
- Be sure that customers and management understand the scheduling impacts, inherent risks, and costs of significant requirements changes. Then let management or the customers (not the developers or testers) decide if the changes are warranted - after all, that's their job.
- Balance the effort put into setting up automated testing with the expected effort required to re-do them to deal with changes.
- Try to design some flexibility into automated test scripts.
- Focus initial automated testing on application aspects that are most likely to remain unchanged.
- Devote appropriate effort to risk analysis of changes to minimize regression testing needs.
- Design some flexibility into test cases (this is not easily done; the best bet might be to minimize the detail in the test cases, or set up only higher-level generic-type test plans)
- Focus less on detailed test plans and test cases and more on ad hoc testing (with an understanding of the added risk that this entails).
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