SYSML17 — Property Based Requirements

In SysML today requirements can be represented in a model only in a textual form. Being textually based these requirements often introduce ambiguity, are often redundant with other model element properties, and lack a formally making it difficult to leverage directly in parametric and other analysis efforts.
This issue suggests an alternative means of representing requirement in the model environment without using a pure text string. The alternative means is referred to as Property Based Requirement (PBR). PBR defines a requirement mathematically and defines a set of requirement properties. The goal is declare other types of model elements as requirements and apply these properties to those model elements.

A PBR theory is described in a paper called “Toward a Property Based Requirements Theory: System Requirements Structured as a Semilattice” by Patrice Micouin. This technique is further elaborated in a paper called “Requirements Management within a Full Model-Based Engineering Approach” by Yves Bernard

Proposal: Property Based Requirements

The issue was resolved with SysML 1.4 and the new SysML element AbstractRequirement that enables the definition of different model elements being a requirement.