Report: Requirements Traceability Matrix
This matrix shows traceability of requirements to test cases, other requirements, defects and activities.
Main Description

Purpose

This matrix is used to "trace" relationships between requirements and other project artifacts in order to

  • verify that all requirements are allocated to system components and other project artifacts
  • determine the source of requirements
  • ensure that all requirements are satisfied
  • locate all components and artifacts that are affected as a result of a requirements change, and to assess impact

Report Analysis

Expected Results - All high-level requirements should be fully transformed or covered by lower-level requirements. The completeness of traceability implies the consistency between each level of requirements.

Missing low-level requirements - The team should look at the source and rationale of each untraced requirement item from Untraced Requirement report and perform root-cause analysis as appropriate. More detail can also be found at Untraced Requirements.

To analyze whether high-level requirements are completely refined into low-level requirements,  use the Requirement Traceability Coverage metric.

Collection and reporting tools

IBM® Rational® Team Concert®, IBM® Rational® DOORS®, IBM® Rational® Requirements Composer®, and IBM® Rational® RequisitePro® collect the data needed to produce a Requirements Traceability Matrix.  IBM® Rational® Insight® produces a Requirements Traceability Matrix report.

More Information
Supporting Materials