Managing non-technical requirements in COTS components selection

Abstract

The selection of COTS components is made not only by an analysis of their technical quality but also (and sometimes mostly) by considering how they fulfill the nontechnical requirements considered relevant, which refer to licensing, reputation, and similar issues. In this paper we present an approach for managing non-technical requirements during COTS selection. The proposal is based on extending the ISO/IEC 9126-1 catalogue of quality factors by adding factors related to non-technical issues, obtaining a cohesive and comprehensive framework for managing requirements during selection. We show how we can use this catalogue for eliciting non-technical requirements, and how the metrics included in the catalogue may be used to define fit criteria for requirements. We illustrate our approach with an industrial experience that took place in the telecommunications field.