June 11, 2024
In our previous article, we examined how deficiencies in requirements management have historically contributed to significant project failures, underscoring the necessity of robust requirement validation processes. In part 3 of an ongoing series with our partner Orca Intelligence, discover the importance of conducting impact analysis in the requirements analysis process and how it can lead to successful project outcomes.
Read MoreJanuary 10, 2024
In the dynamic world of Agile Scrum framework, the essence of project success lies in the meticulous management of requirements and prioritization of tasks. This article, written by Melissa Daley, CEO and Founder of Orca Intelligence, synthesizes key insights from two critical aspects of Agile project management: Requirements Management and Prioritization in the Agile Scrum Process.
Read MoreFebruary 27, 2023
We are excited about the upcoming release of Spira v7.5!
The new version includes, amongst many other features, a brand new SpiraApp called Requirement Multiple Approvals. This new plugin for SpiraTeam and SpiraPlan (not SpiraTest, sorry) will allow you to conduct multiple parallel approvals of a requirement in the system. This much-awaiting feature has been asked for by many of our life sciences customers who need to be able to conduct parallel approvals of requirements.
Read MoreFebruary 21, 2023
We are excited to announce that, following on from the redesign of the main planning board in Spira, we have listened to your feedback around requirements' status. In our new version 7.5 release of Spira coming out shortly, we have changed how the requirements statuses work to give you greater flexibility and control on whether a status appears in the board, and crucially, the order they are displayed in.
Read MoreMarch 30, 2022
On March 29th, Inflectra and partner Orca Intelligence hosted a webinar focused on The Automation of Requirements: Save Time Planning, Creating, and Managing Requirements with Swiftly and SpiraTeam. In this webinar, we covered:
Solicitation Response
Work in SpiraTeam to build out a scope for solicitation and generate an estimate in Swiftly
Agile Project Planning
Plan in detail with SpiraTeam and automatically generate details with Swiftly
Agile Delivery Lifecycle Management
Generate detailed user stories with Swiftly and SpiraTeam
Manage user stories through SpiraTeam.
If you missed the webinar, we have a full recap below.
Read MoreJanuary 10, 2022
We had a customer ask us what was the recommended way to manage the Acceptance Criteria of requirements in a project. There are actually several different ways you can handle acceptance criteria depending on your exact process (and preference):
We discuss each of these options below:
Read MoreJuly 15, 2021
A customer recently posed this question to us:
We are gathering requirements following a standard template for use cases. In that template we record main scenario and alternative flows like shown on the example below. What is the best way to map primary and alternate use case process flows to requirements inside Spira?
This is a relatively common question, so in this blog we outline some ways you can manage and map use cases inside Spira....
Read MoreMay 13, 2021
On May 12th, Inflectra hosted a webinar on Spira version 6.9 in which we covered the new and enhanced functionality, including:
Enhanced Requirements Management Document Views
New Odata functionality for SpiraPlan
99 Custom Properties
Baselining enhancements for SpiraTeam and SpiraPlan.
If you missed the webinar, we have a full for your cap below 👇
Read MoreApril 15, 2021
It is widely agreed in the software industry that one of the keys to delivering high-quality products is to get the requirements "right." However, there is far less consensus on what "right" actually means and even less consensus on the best way to get there. So having powerful requirements management and requirements traceability is vitally important to the software development and testing process. In our latest version of SpiraTeam and SpiraPlan, we have improved the new requirements document view to make it more useful for business analysts (BAs) and other team members.
Read MoreFebruary 24, 2021
We are excited about the next release of Spira 6.8, due to be released in March. As we described in a recent blog post, this new version includes major enhancements to the documents management module to allow users the create and edit inline content directly in Spira. However this new feature also makes it amazing easy to write BDD style requirements and test cases in Spira using Gherkin syntax with automatic syntax highlighting. Intrigued, well read on...
Read MoreAugust 7, 2020
One of the focus areas in the new release v6.6 of SpiraTeam and SpiraPlan is completing the initial support for baselining. This is an exciting new piece of functionality that makes SpiraTeam and SpiraPlan especially well suited for managing requirements, test cases and artifacts on more complex systems and engineering projects.
Read MoreJuly 6, 2020
One of the focus areas in the upcoming release v6.5.2 of SpiraTeam and SpiraPlan is support for baselining. This is an exciting new piece of functionality that will make SpiraTeam and SpiraPlan especially well suited for managing requirements, test cases and artifacts on more complex systems and engineering projects.
Read MoreJune 3, 2020
We are happy to share a blog post by Inflectra’s Director of Technology - Adam Sandman called What’s the Problem with User Stories? published on TechWell Insights website. The blog explores key challenges associated with relying solely on user stories for requirements’ definition.
December 19, 2019
In the following blog post, Sriram Rajagopalan - Inflectra's Enterprise Agile Champion explores how-to's of writing good user stories and gives practical recommendations on how to achieve just that. This blog complements Inflectra's December 17th webinar on the same topic, with the webinar recording available inside.
Read MoreDecember 12, 2019
SpiraPlan is an easy to use, complete solution for managing your product development lifecycle. In this article we discuss the top 10 features you should look for in a product development tool, and why you should choose SpiraPlan over other tools on the market that offer features for product development.
Read MoreAugust 8, 2019
As we get ready for the release of SpiraTest, SpiraTeam, and SpiraPlan 6.2 later this month, we'd like too introduce some of the new functionality that will be available in this release. In the first installment of this series, we're excited to announce the new requirements management views that have been added to SpiraTeam and SpiraPlan 6.2. They are designed to better serve the needs of the Business Analyst community who often need different views of requirements than the project teams and project managers.
Read MoreFebruary 28, 2019
The blog is produced in conjunction with Journey Into Agile With Inflectra - A Free Webinar Course.
The corporate business practices have evolved significantly. The products we develop are getting more complex and sophisticated. No longer are the software always having a graphical user interface for users, as wearable technologies and surgical implants transmitting updates to a mobile app are becoming commonplace. These emerging products, applications, and services will require identifying, gathering, and grooming requirements critical aspects of project management and product development.
Read MoreFebruary 28, 2019
On February 21, 2019, Inflectra and #SriramRajagopalan hosted a webinar on Five Essentials to Managing Your Requirements with SpiraTeam®. This is the 3rd webinar in the certificate series called: Journey Into Agile With Inflectra - A Free Webinar Course.
If you missed the webinar, please enjoy the recap in this blog.
Read MoreJanuary 2, 2019
Inflectra and #sriramrajagopalan are teaming up to bring you a free five-part online training course on agile project lifecycle management called: Journey Into Agile With Inflectra.
Read MoreDecember 11, 2018
One of the major reasons that software projects are cancelled, fail to deliver the expected value or experience massive cost / budget overruns is due to a failure to grasp the risk and issues associated with managing the scope. This article describes the three most common types of scope management failure with suggestions of how to avoid such a fate.
Read MoreOctober 18, 2018
One of the unique needs when designing and developing mission systems for the defense industry, is the fact that you need to be able to trace system requirements to individual test steps in a test case. Based on this advice we received from industry subject matter experts, we added support in SpiraTeam v5 for this feature. However one limitation was that the data migration tools we have for loading data from Excel into SpiraTeam don't let you add requirement - test step links in bulk... until today.
Read MoreOctober 29, 2015
July 3, 2015
Requirements Elicitation is the act of teasing the true needs from users and other stakeholders, including most departments in the development organization such as sales and training. Elicitation is not simply gathering: gathering is a passive action, whereas elicitation is proactive. This article provides some tips on how to best elicit them. Read More
May 20, 2015
User Stories are often characterized by relatively short, uncomplicated and informal descriptions, whereas Use Cases are often longer, more formally structured descriptions of not only the user need but also other details. Can Use Cases strike a balance between the need for agility and the need for more information, and if so, how?
Read MoreMay 13, 2015
In this conclusion we shall see that migration to a test management or requirements management tool can be easier than it might seem initially. Read More
May 7, 2015
When making the transition from document-oriented information storage to record-oriented information management tools, there are a number of problems which can make the process difficult, or even unsuccessful. This second part of our series explains how such pitfalls can occur. Read More
May 5, 2015
Have you ever tried to write a letter in a spreadsheet? Ridiculous idea, right? Or perhaps you’ve tried to do the opposite and store discrete, record-oriented information in a word processor? It can be done using tables, but it’s easier with a spreadsheet. Read More
September 9, 2014
In this item we continue our examination of various Agile methodology ideas and ask whether they are valid or whether they are in fact, industry myths. Read More
September 4, 2014
It is a month till release, and the CEO comes out of the office and says we need a new feature for the release. A week later he modifies the new feature. The developer works hard to please him and delivers, but he doesn't like it. The requirement changes again and now we are a few days from release. how are we going to debug, test, and verify for release if things keep changing? Read More
September 2, 2014
In this item we continue our examination of various Agile methodology ideas and ask whether they are valid or whether they are in fact, industry myths. Read More
August 19, 2014
The enthusiasm these days for Agile development is rightly deserved, but with so much being written and said about Agile development, there should be room for healthy debate. While Agile development has proven to be a huge step forward and the right approach for many projects, it is important to continue to ask questions in order that we don’t start to endorse the bad along with the good. We don’t want to throw the baby out with the bathwater, but we can’t keep the bathwater just to avoid the risk of doing so. An occasional examination of principles being promoted and used within the industry helps to maintain Agile methods as the best alternative to traditional development practices for many projects.
In this series of blog postings we shall discuss some of the characteristics of various Agile methodologies and ask whether the ideas are valid or whether they are in fact, industry myths.
Read MoreAugust 12, 2014
SpiraTeam v4.1 introduced a new feature allowing you to create requirement workflows. This feature allows you to create a workflow that models your signoff process. The question that begs is - what should my requirements signoff process look like...
Read MoreJuly 15, 2014
It is quite a popular notion that there should be formally recorded associations or links between defects and software code configuration items. This can explain why a piece of code has later been modified and also helps individuals find their way back to the ‘fix’ should the defect be found to still exist upon re-testing. But there are other ways to achieve this and so the question is: can the relationship between the defect and the code really be the most important one? Read More
June 4, 2014
While it might seem that the most important consideration when choosing a test management software tool is the set of basic tool features supporting the test process itself, you should not neglect a wide range of other questions that could make or break your test management tool choice. This whitepaper identifies the key attributes you should look for in a test management solution. Read More
April 16, 2014
For a considerable period of time, we did well organized testing, but not against requirements that were formally defined.
Why was it deemed necessary to automate the test management process before there were any decent tools for recording exactly what we were testing for?
Read More
April 8, 2014
When evaluating software features to either build or buy there is a tendency to want to have every possible feature even if it will be rarely (or event never used) on the off-chance that it could be useful. This post describes some of the pitfalls with this approach. Read More
April 1, 2014
(aka The Changing Role of the Modern Father)
One of the difficulties of moving from waterfall to an Agile development process is the breaking down of silos of responsibility, including that of the product owner. No longer the deliverer of the requirements 'master-specification', the product owner now participates throughout the entire process, sharing the requirements management task and taking on new, varied and, sometimes unexpected, responsibilities.
Read MoreMarch 11, 2014
Requirements Engineering (RE) is often trivialized as an activity performed by well meaning analysts before they start doing the real work of specifying a product. This whitepaper introduces the critical processes and procedures used when executing effective Requirements Engineering as part of an overall successful project. Read More
February 24, 2014
If you are looking for a requirements management tool, you probably don't need to be told how important requirements management is. There are a number of standard questions to be asked when selecting any software product for your organization. Read More
February 11, 2014
Library users who spent many hours, perhaps over many years, saving their favorite titles for future reading enjoyment, suddenly found that after the upgrade of the Washington, DC library catalog system, all their favorites were gone. Vanished. Not a trace!
Read More