Analyzing and Systematizing Current Traceability Schemas

The aim of this work is to produce a traceability model to enhance processes and tasks, which make extensive use of traceability information such as, V&V, change management and impact analysis, under the roundtrip engineering approach. This paper analyzes several current traceability approaches, in order to obtain their relevant features, to identify overlaps and inconsistencies between them, and to select the best traceability practices. It was identified that, several issues still make difficult the adoption of a wide-scale traceability activity, in the software/system engineering practice, such as, there is a lack of a commonly accepted traceability definition, a standard way of specifying traceability between artifacts, and a traceability type classification. Basing on these findings, an approach for a "traceability schema specification" and a first implementation on a software/system engineering environment are provided. The schema attempts to systematize the definition, deployment and maintenance of a traceability implementation