Functional requirements

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Please note that ICA-AtoM is no longer actively supported by Artefactual Systems.
Visit https://www.accesstomemory.org for information about AtoM, the currently supported version.

Main Page > System Requirements > Functional requirements


Functional requirements state what the system must be able to do. The requirements provide:

  • Parameters for designing the system.
  • Criteria for testing the system (used in initial release and future iterations and upgrades).
  • Planning guidelines for developing the system (improve existing or add new functionality).
  • Documentation for standards compliance (link requirements to relevant international or national descriptive standards)
  • A framework for structuring user-end documentation (step-by-step procedures for how to do things in the system).


Functional requirements are organized hierarchically. There are six main requirements, eqch of which is broken down into sub- and sub-sub-requirements:


Each functional requirement includes some or all of the following information:

Requirement number FNC-x.x.x (unique tracking number assigned to requirement)
Requirement name Descriptive name assigned to requirement.
Requirement specification Brief description of requirement: system must do X.
Source quotation Links to standards or other documents: why must the system be able to do X?
Associated metadata requirements Links to metadata requirements: what data must the system capture in order to be able to do X?
Associated quality requirements What design and interface features must the system have to do X well?
Associated technical requirements Links to technical requirements: what system architecture, hardware / software configurations, and programming rules must the system implement to do X?
ICA-AtoM implementation Brief description of how ICA-AtoM implements X.
Known issues Brief indication of known problems or limitations in the current version of ICA-AtoM that should be addressed in future releases.
Use cases Links to descriptions of scenarios relating to the requirement and how they are handled in ICA-AtoM.
User Manual sections Links to the User manual sections that provide step-by-step instructions for doing X.
Sub-requirements If the requirement is broken down into sub-requirements, provides links to these.