Stakeholders and Requirements The MulchNetwork is a green waste recycling business.

1. Stakeholders and Requirements 

The MulchNetwork is a green waste recycling business. It connects tree contractors that have excess products to local clients who want those products, through its internet based referral service. This referral service is based on postal codes. 

The main product is mulch. This is the tree branches and leaves that are removed from people's gardens and then shredded and made available for sale. 

Small-scale mulching might look like this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o5bGutWbqpw  

However, commercial tree contractors generally have too much to use themselves, and send the prunings to landfill sites. 

MulchNetwork saves adding to landfill sites, by joining clients and tree contractors supplying mulch and firewood and other services, such as tree pruning. 

Clients can register on-line for the services offered through MulchNetwork:  a quote from a tree contractor to do some pruning  a load of mulch  a load of firewood.  

Tree contractors also register online and can access the database 24/7 for a local client if they need to empty their truck. They save fuel and expensive downtime and the client receives a load of mulch or firewood. 

The managers of MulchNetwork want an information system Eze-Mulch to automate the process of assigning clients and contractors, so that clients can have advance notice of when 

 3 

they will receive the product ordered and from which contractor. Contractors want to know at the end of every day what the work schedule for the next two (2) days will be, and where (which postal code). The role for each job on the schedule (as pruner or deliverer) is also needed by the contractor, to ensure their truck is never overfull. The contractor also needs to indicate when they are unavailable (eg only work on weekends; don't work Monday; etc). 

The system will combine calendaring and scheduling with a mechanism for advance notice of work schedule and messaging to find a substitute tree contractor when the most local is not available. The Eze-Mulch system will have a central secure database and be accessible through the web and mobile devices by the management, contractors and the clients. 

Eze-Mulch needs to maintain information about the clients, including whether they are individual or corporate (such as schools, local government or businesses). 

Eze-Mulch should send out text messages a day before a scheduled job, and reminder messages the morning of the scheduled job. Ideally it should enable a call on a GPS system (such as Google Maps) to show where the job is and how to get there. If a scheduled contractor is unable to fulfil a job (either pruning or delivering) a notification can be sent to Eze-Mulch, which will then assign a substitute.  

(a) List the stakeholders for the proposed Eze-Mulch system, and in each case explain what their interest in the system is.  

 (b) List and briefly describe the functional requirements for the Eze-Mulch system as identified in the description.  

(c) Using the FURPS+ categories, identify and briefly describe several non-functional requirements for Eze-Mulch. Address all of the categories (URPS+): if you consider that any of them are irrelevant, explain why.