Generic Spec Template

From UG

Contents 1 General Info and Scope 1.1 Scope 2 Business Needs and Business Requirements 3 Notes from Systems Architect 4 Preliminary Design / Prototype 5 Detailed Design (Technical Specification) 5.1 Summary 5.2 Objects and Fields 5.3 User Interface 5.4 Functionality / Use Cases 5.5 Special Cases and Misc 6 Quality Assurance 6.1 Test Cases 7 Look And Feel 8 Figures 8.1 Figure 1: 9 Misc 9.1 Link to User Guide 9.2 Questions 9.3 Request For Comments (Suggestions and Ideas) 9.4 Known Non Critical Bugs 10 History 10.1 Links to Archived / Old specs 10.2 (Re-design) (Tweak) (Spec Update): ..... <summary> ..... 11 Implementation 12 DB 13 Front End Code 14 Back End Code

General Info and Scope

• Classified As: (small) (large) component / common feature / ...
• Parent Mantis: tbd

• Prerequisites:
  • read ...
  • ...

Scope

TBD

Business Needs and Business Requirements

• This section is defined by Business Analyst
• In this section this component/feature is defined from the business standpoint. All important points are listed. It could include some design details if business insists on specific design.

Notes from Systems Architect

• This section is defined by Systems Architect. It is written after #Business Requirements are defined.
• The purpose of this section is to give direction to System Analysts who will write detailed specification.

Preliminary Design / Prototype

• In some cases (component is non standard) we need to do preliminary not so detailed design before detailed final.
• This section does not have to be too detailed or too formalized. We shall not spend too much time on Prototypes - they can change many times.

Detailed Design (Technical Specification)

• This section is defined by Systems Analyst.
• It contains detailed technical design is written after #Business Requirements and #Technical Requirements are defined.

Summary

Objects and Fields

• Normally what gets stored/retrieved from DB

User Interface

Functionality / Use Cases

• This section you could spit into two. But often it is hard to do since often most of functionality is UI related

Special Cases and Misc

• If any exist

Quality Assurance

This section is to be written by QA Engineer or QA Manager or Systems Analyst.

Test Cases

• List unusual scenarios - things that user most of the time would not do but system must handle well
• Do not list Common Test Cases - link to them

Look And Feel

• This section is to be written / defined by Graphic Designer and UI Designer.
• This includes:
  • final graphics
  • final layout
• Layout defined here should refine, provide more detials to "functional definitions" of UI as defined in #User Interface and Functionality section above

Figures

Figure 1:

Misc

Link to User Guide

Questions

Request For Comments (Suggestions and Ideas)

Known Non Critical Bugs

• Critical bugs must be posted into Mantis

History

Links to Archived / Old specs

(Re-design) (Tweak) (Spec Update): ..... <summary> .....

<wiki date/signature>

• mantis: <link>
• Biz Req updated? N/Y
• Tech Spec updated? N/Y

Implementation

DB

Front End Code

Back End Code