A Practical Comparison of Major Domain Analysis Approaches. Towards a Customizable Domain Analysis Framework

When attempting to perform a domain analysis, practi tioners face a difficult choice. Which of the existing methods should be chosen and will it work in their particular envi ronment? A number of domain analysis approaches have been proposed in the literature. Most argue that they are appli cable to any domain and situation. Yet, we found that this was not always the case as illustrated by the practical situ ations our technology transfer group faced. We observed that depending on the context, each method possesses strengths and weaknesses. The optimal solution should then be to combine parts of these methods in a way specifically adapted to the project situation encountered. Using a case study where we applied three major ap proaches to a particular domain, we argue for a customiz able domain analysis approach that would be instantiated depending both on the nature of the domain(s) and on the project characteristics in which it would be applied.