Identify Prototyping Opportunity (Process Notes 7.1.4)

The task here is to identify which parts of the requirements would benefit most from the building of a prototype.

For each event or use case in the requirements specification, ask the following questions:

• Does the event/use case have a high customer reward (or penalty), or is it composed of a set of requirements that have a high customer reward (or penalty)?

• Is the event/use case central to the strategic plan for the product?

• Is the event/use case composed of more than 50 percent unmeasurable requirements?

• Can you specify the benefit of building a prototype for this event/use case?

For each event/use case, if the answers to these questions are all yes, then you have identified a prototyping opportunity.

The point of building prototypes during requirements specification is to find requirements that have been forgotten and to clarify requirements that are not clear. For this reasons, Steve McMenamin refers to prototypes as "requirements bait."