Embedding Quality into Software Product Line Variability Artifacts

The success of any software product line development project is closely tied to its domain variability management. Whereas a lot of effort has been put into functional variability management by the SPL community, non-functional variability is considered implicit. The result has been dissatisfaction among clients due to resultant poor quality systems. This work presents an integrated requirement specification template for quality and functional requirements at software product line variation points. The implementation of this approach at the analytical description phase increases the visibility of quality requirements obliging developers to implement them. The approach proposes the use of decision tree classification techniques to support the weaving of functional quality attributes at respective variation points. This work, therefore, promotes software product line variability management objectives by proposing new functional quality artifacts during requirements specification phase. The approach is illustrated with an exemplar mobile phone family data storage requirements case study.