Software patterns and requirements engineering activities in real-world settings: A systematic mapping study

Abstract

Context: The use of software patterns has been investigated extensively in the last decades. Unfortunately, scarce evidence exists about the application of software patterns at the early stages of software development. Furthermore, few works reported on their application in industrial environments. Objective: To provide an overview of the application of software patterns in real-world contexts during requirements engineering (RE) activities. Method: We conduct a systematic mapping study to gather evidence published up to March 2017. Results: the search strategies retrieved 3,070 works, of which twenty-two were selected. We identified 327 software patterns. Use Cases was, by far, the source of a higher number of patterns. Fifty percent of the papers use the patterns to elicit requirements, while the other 50% included mentions to combinations of RE activities. Most of the patterns produced an increase in the quality, as well as a reduction of the project time. Conclusions: patterns positively affect RE activities. Patterns are also useful for assisting novice developers. The measurement of the impact is not always performed with the same metrics, which makes it difficult to compare results. Practitioners need a manageable set of patterns and efficient guides for their application in real projects.