Looking for **software requirements document** templates

Question

I'm looking for some effective and freely available templates for software/product requirements documents (PRDs). Anyone know of any good resources?

Thanks, Yarin

Answer 1

Process Impact has some great templates and can get you started. For example, here's a link to the DOC for the Software Requirements Specification.

Answer 2

Not freely available except for academic purposes, but cheap, is the extensive set of templates put together by http://www.volere.co.uk

Answer 3

Avoid the temptation to make a standard template for specs. At first you might just think that it's important that "every spec look the same." Hint: it's not. What difference does it make? Does every book on your bookshelf at home look exactly the same? Would you want them to?

...

A spec is a document that you want people to read. In that way, it is no different than an essay in The New Yorker or a college paper. Have you ever heard of a professor passing out templates for students to write their college papers? Have you ever read two good essays that could be fit into a template? Just drop the idea.

source: Painless Functional Specifications, Joel Spolsky (one of Stack Overflow's founders)