EARS18

This workshop will focus on exploring and sharing best practice on the practical application of the Easy Approach to Requirements Syntax (EARS). Since its introduction in 2009, EARS has been progressively adopted by practitioners across many different domains all over the world and is also taught in numerous universities. This workshop aims to build a community of EARS users who can share their experiences of successes and challenges when applying the EARS approach.

EARS has been used in a wide range of contexts including: formally and informally; across the system development lifecycle; for requirements at all system levels ; in diverse domains; in different geographic regions; by authors whose first language is not English. EARS is used in areas at the edge of or even beyond the traditional RE space, such as in Work Instructions, Testing, Safety, Legal and Regulatory texts. As such EARS can provide an effective bridge between RE and other disciplines.

Anticipated outcomes include:

1. Consolidated sets of application domains, system levels, requirement types, project phases and development environments in which EARS has been successfully deployed. This information could help existing users apply EARS more effectively and enable new adopters to understand where EARS might be applicable and how it could be used.
2. A shared understanding of the limitations of the EARS approach and what approaches can complement it to mitigate any shortcomings.
3. A list of requirements specification challenges with candidate solutions to serve as exemplars.
4. The establishment of an EARS community/user group.

Everyone is welcome to attend. We especially invite practitioners and researchers who have used EARS or who write requirements in Natural Language. The emphasis is on the practical application and roll-out of EARS (communication, training, coaching, support, tooling). However, attendees do not need any prior knowledge of EARS.

In addition to practitioners working with requirements, the workshop will be of interest to students who are looking for practical hands-on experience with requirements