A linguistic analysis engine for natural language use case description and its application to dependability analysis in industrial use cases

Abstract

We present 1) a novel linguistic engine made of configurable linguistic components for understanding natural language use case specification; and 2) results of the first of a kind large scale experiment of application of linguistic techniques to industrial use cases. Requirement defects are well known to have adverse effects on dependability of software systems. While formal techniques are often cited as a remedy for specification errors, natural language remains the predominant mode for specifying requirements. Therefore, for dependable system development, a natural language processing technique is required that can translate natural language textual requirements into validation ready computer models. In this paper, we present the implementation details of such a technique and the results of applying a prototype implementation of our technique to 80 industrial and academic use case descriptions. We report on the accuracy and effectiveness of our technique. The results of our experiment are very encouraging. ©2009 IEEE.