Vision Document[1]

<System>

Team <#, names>

 

Note:  Throughout this document, it should maintain the flavor of being an internal version of key requirements and constraints for this project, such as how this project should be interpreted in terms of the wider goals of the development organization.  It also should maintain the flavor of being a longer term view than just release 1.0 of that project, also alluding to what has come before and/or is likely to come after.

 

Revision History

Date

Version

Description

Edited by

 

1.0

Initial Draft

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 Introduction

Provide an overview of the entire Vision document.

 

1.1  Purpose of the Vision Document

State the purpose of he Vision document, to collect, analyze, and define high-level user needs and features of the product.

 

1.2  Product Overview

State the purpose of the application, its version, and new features for delivery.

 

1.3  References

Provide a complete list of all documents referenced elsewhere in the Vision document.

 

2 User Description

Briefly describe the perspective of the users of your system.

 

2.1 User/Market Demographics

Summarize the key market demographics that motivate your product decisions.

 

2.2 User Profiles

Briefly describe the prospective users of your system.  (Especially, for the few main categories of these users.)

 

2.3 User Environment

Describe the working environment, including elements such as applications and platforms in use, and specific usage models.

 

2.4 Key User Needs

List the key problems or needs as perceived by the user.

 

2.5 Alternatives and Competition

 

Identify any alternatives the user perceives as available.

 

3 Product Overview

 

3.1 Product Perspective

Provide a block diagram of the product or system and its interfaces to the external environment.

 

3.2 Product Position Statement

Provide an overall statement summarizing, at the highest level, the unique position the product intends to fill in the marketplace.  Moore (1991) recommends the following format:

 

For

(target customer)

Who

(statement of the need or opportunity)

The (product name)

is a (product category)

That

(statement of key benefit; that is, compelling reason to buy)

Unlike

(primary competitive alternative)

Our product

(statement of primary differentiation)

 

3.3 Summary of Capabilities

Summarize the major benefits and features the product will provide.

 

Customer Benefit

Supporting Features

Benefit 1

Feature

Benefit 2

Feature

Benefit 3

Feature

 

 

 

3.4 Assumptions and Dependencies

What’s beyond our control because it relies on outside organizations or other factors.

 

3.5 Cost and Pricing

Describe any elements of continuing product cost as well as anticipated product price points.

 

4. Feature Attributes

Describe the feature attributes that will be used to evaluate, track, prioritize, and manage the features.  The following are some suggestions:

 

Status

Proposed, Approved, Incorporated

Priority

Cumulative vote results; order ranking, or Critical, Important, Useful

Effort

Low, Medium, High; team-weeks; or person-months

Risk

Low, Medium, High

Stability

Low, Medium, High

Target release

Version number

Assigned to

Name

Reason

Text field describing this

 

 

 

5. Product Features

This section of the document lists the product features.  Below is the format used in the example vision document (note the beneficial switch to landscape format):

 


Feature No.

Description

Priority

Effort

Risk

Targeted Release

Use Case

Comments

1

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

3

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

4

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

5

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

6

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

7

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

8

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

9

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

10

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


6. Exemplary Use Cases

Describe a few key use cases, perhaps those that are architecturally significant or those that will most readily help the reader understand how the system is intended to be used.

 

7. Other Product Requirements

 

7.1 Applicable Standards

List all standards with which the product must comply.

 

7.2 System Requirements

Define any system requirements necessary to support the application, such as operating systems, network performance, and the like.

 

7.3 Licensing, Security, and Installation

Describe any licensing, security, or installation requirements that also affect the development effort or that create the need for separate installation software.

 

7.4 Performance Requirements

Use this section to detail performance requirements.

 

7.5 etc.  – Similarly for other key nonfunctional requirements

 

8. Documentation Requirements

Describe the documentation that must be developed to support successful application deployment.

 

8.1 User Manual

Describe the purpose and contents of the product user manual.

 

8.2 Online Help

 

8.3 Installation and Configuration

List requirements for online help, tool tips, and so on.

 

8.4 Labeling and Packaging

 

9.  Glossary

 



[1] Format from Leffingwell & Widrig, Managing Software Requirements, Second Edition.  Addison-Wesley, 2003, ISBN 0-321-12247-X, pp. 175-6.