Editing Traceability (section)

==Systems and software development==
In systems and [[software development]], the term traceability (or [[requirements traceability]]) refers to the ability to link product requirements back to stakeholders' rationales and forward to corresponding design artifacts, code, and [[test case]]s. Traceability supports numerous [[software engineering]] activities such as [[change impact analysis]], compliance verification or traceback of code, [[Regression testing|regression test]] selection, and requirements validation. It is usually accomplished in the form of a matrix created for the [[Verification and Validation|verification and validation]] of the project. Unfortunately, the practice of constructing and maintaining a [[Traceability matrix|requirements trace matrix]] (RTM) can be very arduous and over time the traces tend to erode into an inaccurate state unless date/time stamped. Alternate automated approaches for generating traces using [[information retrieval]] methods have been developed.

In transaction processing software, traceability implies use of a unique piece of data (e.g., order date/time or a serialized sequence number) which can be traced through the entire software flow of all relevant application programs. Messages and files at any point in the system can then be audited for correctness and completeness, using the traceability key to find the particular transaction. This is also sometimes referred to as the transaction footprint.