Importance of NFR (which has become Negligent Functional Requirements).

Lets give life to EFR / NFR (treated as Negligent Fundamental Requirements) to thrive user experience.

May be because NFRs (Non-Functional Requirements) are always considered negligent, alternative name EFRs (Extra Functional Requirements) came into picture long back, though not prevalent. In recent few years, digital revolution has brought lot of importance to User Experience (UX) which can be addressed via NFRs / EFRs.  

Nowadays, we see more awareness on this as everyone now understand the underlying fact –

“UX cannot be an optional quality for my digital product? So are the EFRs.”

What are Extra Functional Requirements (EFRs)?

A Functional Requirement (FR) specifies what a system needs to do whereas an Extra Functional Requirement (EFR) describes how the system will do it. Usually EFRs specifies the quality attributes of a digital product describing the user experience of the system. It is applicable to system as a whole & cannot be categorized to individual features.

News about losing credibility, competitor wins, etc becoming headlines often, nowadays every digital product owner shows lot of importance in User Experience (UX) & thereby to EFRs. Everyone now understands the mantra “Success or failure of the digital product is mainly decided by the EFRs”.

EFRs usually exist with interrelationships, sometimes making it very challenging to measure the quality of an EFR in isolation where interrelationship exists. For example, Performance EFR is related to Scalability, Availability & Capacity. Hence certifying the system for Performance EFR often seem incomplete without accounting EFR related to Scalability, Availability & Capacity.

EFRs are grouped considering its relevance to type of users. As an end user, Performance & Security are essential EFRs whereas for a developer maintainability & reusability will be of more relevance.

• EFRs relevant for End Users (for improving User Experience):       
• Performance, Security, Usability, UX, Accessibility, Reliability, Scalability,    Availability,   Capacity, Flexibility, Interoperability, Compatibility, etc.

• EFRs relevant for Developers / Testers during SDLC:
•  Maintainability, Reusability, Testability, Portability, Supportability, Packaging requirements, etc.

Direct Mapping of User Concerns to EFRs:

As EFRs represent the quality characteristics of the systems, it can be easily mapped to end user concerns related to user experience. Few examples provided below.

•          Speed & Resource utilization - Performance & Capacity
•          Unauthorized Access - Security
•          Ease of Use – Usability
•          Likelihood of Failure – Reliability
•          Ease of Change & Repair – Maintainability / Flexibility

EFRs are generally informally stated, often contradictory, difficult to enforce during development and evaluate for the customer prior to delivery. But now in the recent days, this trend is changing exponentially as user experience (UX) is being thought as a prime factor for digital product success. It is our responsibility to educate our team & sometimes our customer about the importance of NFRs / EFRs. Do not regret for missing NFRs anymore. Be a catalyst to bring this change in the projects where you are involved.

“To measure is to know. If you cannot measure it, you cannot improve it.”

Check out the entire article @

http://elitesouls.in/give-life-to-efr-nfr-treated-as-negligent-fundamental-requirements-to-thrive-ux/

Happy EFR Testing!!!