Can you explain SRS and its key elements?

A software requirements specification (SRS) is a description of a software system to be developed. It lays out functional and non-functional requirements. SRS is the official statement of what the system developers should implement. An SRS is a complete description of the behavior of the system to be developed. An SRS should include both a definition of user requirements and a specification of the system requirements. The SRS fully describes what the software will precisely describe the software product that will be built.

SRS is a software requirement specification. It is an artefact derived after doing requirement analysis of gathered stakeholder and business requirements. Because the SRS is created by a business analyst after analysing the crux of the project, it acts as a source of requirements from the client stakeholders to developers, which then helps kick-off the start of project development. These are a set of guidelines to be followed while preparing the software requirement specification document. The purpose, scope, functional and non-functional requirements, software and hardware requirements of the project are included in SRS. It contains environmental conditions required, safety and security requirements, and software quality attributes of the project.

It contains the technical information and technical aspects related to the project or product as a whole. The SRS document, when finished, should be sent to client stakeholders for their approval on finalised functional and non-functional requirements and other technical information included inside the SRS document. Usability, performance, and quality requirements are also included in the SRS document.

Any SRS will have the following basic structure and key elements attached to it:

An introduction providing an overview of the product or feature, acronyms used in the document, and a definition of the explanation of acronyms. Furthermore, SRS contains operational requirements of the application, which includes the software and hardware requirements. The references like Request foe proposal(RFP), Stakeholder requirements, and URD or BRD documents used for creating SRS are mentioned inside SRS. SRS includes diagrams and designs, and supporting flows, along with the constraints are included in SRS.

Under constraints, we can have a list of usages of tools, programming languages, DB, conventions, and formats for development. If the system needs some external components to be integrated that are being developed somewhere else, we are dependent upon that project to supply the correctly operating components on schedule.

Risks and factors that can impact the requirements are highlighted broadly so that everyone can understand the possible risks to the project. The SRS provides us with a clear difference between the current system and the proposed system, as well as a list of benefits we are going to get after switching from the current system to the proposed system.

Requirements related to UI like its contents, the contents of the project, the modules getting implemented and requirements broken down and categorized under each module are displayed in a detailed manner. It contains other parameters like acceptance criteria. which will describe prototypes, applications and other supporting documentation like user guides and installation guides.

The explanation of how the process flow will be, the data flow diagrams explaining how the data will be flowing in between the systems and interfaces the interface diagrams displaying the interactions between the interfaces will also be included in the SRS document.

In short, I have to list only the key elements of an SRS. They would be as follows:

1. Introduction: Purpose, intended use, scope, intended audience, definition, and acronyms
2. Overall description: User needs, assumptions and dependencies
3. System features and requirements: functional and non-functional requirements, external interface requirements, system features, performance and quality requirements