Quality Attribute Workshops

: Quality attribute workshops (QAW) provide a method for evaluating the architecture of a software-intensive system during the acquisition phase of major programs. The architecture is evaluated against a number of critical quality attributes, such as availability, performance, security, interoperability, and modifiability. The evaluation is based on test cases that capture questions and concerns elicited from various stakeholders associated with the system. The process of eliciting questions allows stakeholders to communicate directly, thereby exposing assumptions that may not have surfaced during requirements capture. Our experience to date includes twelve quality attribute workshops that were held with three different U.S. Government acquisition programs. In this report, we provide a rationale for developing the process and describe it in detail. We follow this with a list of lessons learned and discuss how these lessons have helped us evolve the process to its current state.