Artifact: Vision

Vision	The Vision defines the stakeholders view of the product to be developed, specified in terms of the stakeholders key needs and features. Containing an outline of the envisioned core requirements, it provides the contractual basis for the more detailed technical requirements.
Role:	System Analyst
Templates:	HTML Template: Vision HTML Template: Vision (for small projects) Others
Examples:	Vision, from the Course Registration System example website Vision, from the Collegiate Sports Paging System (e-business)
More Information:	Checkpoints:Vision Checkpoints: Stakeholder Requests Checkpoints: Requirements Attributes Artifact: Requirements Management Plan
Purpose Timing Responsibility Additional Information Tailoring

Input to Activities:

Capture a Common Vocabulary

Find Actors and Use Cases

Elicit Stakeholder Requests

Detail a Business Use Case

Find Business Workers and Entities

Capture a Common Business Vocabulary

Find Business Actors and Use Cases

Review Requirements

Detail a Use Case

Detail the Software Requirements

Identify Test Ideas

Model the User-Interface

Compile Software Development Plan

Develop Business Case

Develop Iteration Plan

Identify and Assess Risks

Define Project Organization and Staffing

Develop Measurement Plan

Develop Product Acceptance Plan

Assess Iteration

Develop Quality Assurance Plan

Write Configuration Management (CM) Plan

Project Approval Review

Project Planning Review

Agree Mission

Identify Test Motivators

Prioritize Use Cases

Architectural Analysis

Define Test Approach

Develop Vision

Manage Dependencies

Assess Viability of Architectural Proof-of-Concept

Output from Activities:

Develop Vision

Manage Dependencies

Assess Viability of Architectural Proof-of-Concept

Purpose

The Vision document provides a high-level–sometimes contractual–basis for the more detailed technical requirements. There can also be a formal requirements specification. The Vision captures very high-level requirements and design constraints to give the reader an understanding of the system to be developed. It provides input to the project-approval process and is, therefore, intimately related to the Business Case. It communicates the fundamental "whys and what's" related to the project and is a gauge against which all future decisions should be validated.

The Vision document will be read by managers, funding authorities roles in use-case modeling, and developers in general.

Timing

The Vision document is created early in the inception phase, and it is used as a basis for the Business Case (see Artifact: Business Case) and the first draft of the Risk List (see Artifact: Risk List).

The Vision document serves as input to use-case modeling, and is updated and maintained as a separate artifact throughout the project.

Responsibility

A system analyst is responsible for the integrity of the Vision document, ensuring that:

Additional Information

A project vision is meant to be changeable as the understanding of requirements, architecture, plans, and technology evolves. However, it should be changing slowly and normally throughout the earlier portion of the lifecycle.

It is important to express the vision in terms of its use cases and primary scenarios as these are developed, so that you can see how the vision is realized by the use cases. The use cases also provide an effective basis for evolving a test case suite.

The original author can be anybody, but when the project is established, the Vision is the responsibility of the system analyst.

Tailoring

Tailor as necessary for your project's needs. It is generally good practice to keep the Vision brief in order to be able to release it to stakeholders as soon as possible, and to make it easy for stakeholders to review and absorb. This is done by including only the most important stakeholder requests and features, and avoiding detailed requirements. Details may be captured in the other requirements artifacts, or in appendices.

Decide whether feature attributes are documented here or in the Requirements Management Plan. Decide what information (attributes) to include in the Vision, and which to manage using requirements management tools, such as Rational RequisitePro (see Tool Mentor: Developing a Vision using Rational RequisitePro®).