7.4 Requirements Traceability Matrix
Section 7, Item Pass/Fail Criteria of a test plan has four sub-sections: 7.1 Evaluation Team, 7.2 Exit Criteria, 7.3 Evaluation Process, and 7.4 Requirements Traceability Matrix.
This sub-section on the 7.4 Requirements Traceability Matrix specifies what tools will be used to track:
- Incidents to the Test Cases that produced them.
- Test Cases Acceptance Criteria for which Test Cases were developed.
- Acceptance Criteria back to the Requirements from which they were extracted
This results in you being able to trace an Incident back to the Requirement and Business Scenario it effects. A useful tool for these matrices is a straightforward set of spreadsheets.
Sample Text for 7.4 Requirements Traceability Matrix
The requirements will be traced using a series of spreadsheets:
- Requirements against Business Scenarios. To check that all functionality to deliver Business Scenarios has been defined.
- Business Scenarios against Acceptance Criteria. To see that every Business Scenario has been dealt with.
- Acceptance Criteria against Test Cases. To check that all Acceptance Criteria are included in at least one Test Case.
- Test Cases against Incidents: to record the results of the tests.
- Requirements against Incidents. To enable a judgement to be made about the quality of the system.
Other Articles on QUALITY
- 7. Item Pass/Fail Criteria gives an overview of how to evaluate the testing data to make a pass/fail decision.
- Basics of Project Plans gives further information on item 2:"Long or Unrealistic Timescales" and item 4:"Scope Creep" as two of the five key characteristics of a project plan and the importance of balancing them.
- Verification and Validation has further information on item 6:"Poor Testing" by explaining what the terms Verification and Validation mean.