It is very easy to tell a young programmer that he should have documented requirements. S/he is likely to agree but the follow up is for them to ask you exactly what that means and how it should be done.

Those of you who are experienced contractors know all too well how poorly this part of software development is done by most companies that do it at all. Among all the other requirements for requirements documents is that they should be readable and informative.

This book sets out to provide guidance on how to prepare software requirements documents. If we can persuade more to follow the guidelines of this book (or some other effective guidelines) I would expect a considerable improvement not only in these documents but the whole process of which these are just a small, though important, part.

If you need to prepare requirements documents or provide guidance to a neophyte this book will be well worth its price. If you write software without these documents, read the book and decide whether you shouldn't change your working practices.