In this article, I’ll be discussing some other requirements gathering methods that complement use case modelling and should be used to ensure your requirements gathering goes swimmingly (see Use Cases – an Introduction for more on use case modelling).
In particular, I’ll be mentioning storyboarding in business analysis, wire framing in business analysis, and prototyping in business analysis.
I’ll also cover what level of quality and detail you should adopt when applying these visual techniques in the context of business analysis.
Finally, I’ll describe how you can use these documents alongside use case modelling.
Use cases are perfect, aren’t they?
You might ask why we would waste our time with other techniques for gathering functional requirements when we have the use case model. There is no approach that is foolproof and different people respond better to different techniques.
Some people like very visual approaches and some are comfortable in the abstract. Others may prefer something very concrete and need something engaging and are easily distracted. The following techniques tend to be very visual, concrete and engaging. Use cases, on the other hand, are partly visual, not particularly engaging and somewhat abstract.
Why I am I wasting my time with use cases at all?
That will become apparent as we discuss the alternatives and the value they provide.
