ABSTRACT
This talk presents an initial ontology for reasoning about a system’s quality attributes (QAs), ilities, or non-functional requirements (reliability, usability, affordability, etc.). The need for such an ontology is based primarily on two factors. One is the importance of getting a system’s QAs sufficiently well defined that the system’s definition, development and evolution result in a satisfactory balance of QA values for the system’s success-critical stakeholders, given the frequent system shortfalls and overruns that occur when this balance is not achieved. The other is that current system acquisition and evolution guidance descriptions have numerous deficiencies and inconsistencies in their coverage of QA considerations. This situation is becoming more serious as systems and their stakeholders become increasingly complex, dynamic, and diverse. This talk provides an elaboration of the needs, a set of initial QA ontology elements and definitions, examples of their application to some key QAs and their relationships, and an identification of further research and development needed to make the ontology fully useful and evolvable.

BIOGRAPHY
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barry_Boehm