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Use a Discussion Summary
All of the interaction with the users, stakeholders, and other people who have relevant
perspectives will yield a great deal of information. The requirements analyst should cap-
ture this information as accurately as possible. Some people find that taking notes on
paper (rather than using a computer) allows for better capture of information. However,
note-taking software, which captures the interviews in an audio file and links notes to
their correct time offset in that file, can also be a useful tool.
Once all of the information has been gathered from the elicitation activities, the require-
ments analyst should use a discussion summary to validate the information. The discussion
summary allows all of the notes to be summarized into a single document; that document
should be distributed to the main users and stakeholders for a deskcheck (see Chapter 5).
This will help catch any potential defects before they make it into the requirements docu-
mentation. Table 6-1 contains a template for the discussion summary.
TABLE 6-1. Discussion summary template
1. Project background
a. Purpose of project
b. Scope of project
c. Other background information
2. Perspectives
a. Who will use the system?
b. Who can provide input about the system?
3. Project objectives
a. Known business rules
b. System information and/or diagrams
c. Assumptions and dependencies
d. Design and implementation constraints
4. Risks
5. Known future enhancements
6. References
7. Open, unresolved, or TBD issues

Most, if not all, of the notes gathered by a requirements analyst during the elicitation
activities should fit into the discussion summary template. Conversely, the discussion
summary template can serve as a guide for a novice requirements analyst in leading inter-
views and meetings.
The requirements analyst should go through all of her notes when writing the discussion
summary. Each note that will be relevant to the behavior of the software should be sum-
marized and added to one of the sections of the discussion summary. The discussion sum-
mary will be ready to distribute when it contains all of the information gathered during
the elicitation sessions.

102 CHAPTER SIX