Update Imported Requirements

You can import referenced requirements from external requirements source documents, then update them when changes are made to the source document. To import referenced requirements, open the Requirements Editor click Import, choose the source document and check the option to Allow updates from external source. When you import requirements as referenced requirements from external requirement documents, they retain a reference to the source document. Check if you have an updated version of the source document by refreshing an import node. The top import node icon changes to when an updated source document is available, indicating that the timestamp of the source document is more recent than the last imported or updated timestamp.

Select the updated version of the source document during the Update operation. Alternatively, you can update the file name and location of the source requirements document by right-clicking the top node of the requirement set and selecting Update source document name or location.

Update a Requirement Set

To update your requirements in the requirement set, select the Import node in the Requirements Editor. In the right pane, under Requirements Interchange click Update.

Updating requirements:

Matches the previously imported requirements to the updated source requirements and updates the requirements in the new version of the document. This includes overwriting any local changes you made to unlocked requirements.
Generates comments about the differences between the document versions. You can view comments when you select the top Import node in the requirement set in the right pane under Comments.
Updates the modifiedOn value for the updated requirements and the updatedOn value for the top Import node of the requirement set.
Marks the requirement set as dirty, even if the requirements data did not change because its updatedOn value changed.
Preserves links to updated requirements.
Preserves requirement SIDs.
Preserves comments on requirements.
Preserves local custom attributes you create within Requirements Toolbox™. See Add Custom Attributes to Requirements for more information about creating custom attributes for requirements.

Updating requirements does not change the links to updated requirements, the requirement SIDs, the comments on requirements, or local custom attributes you create. If attributes in the requirement set and the external source document use the same name, the updated requirements use the attribute values defined in the external source document.

Update Requirements with Change Tracking Enabled

If you have change tracking enabled, and there are changes to a requirement with links, updating requirements might trigger change issues that you might have to resolve:

Match: No changes were detected between document versions. When you import different versions of the same document, the Update operation might detect only white space differences, such as carriage returns, line feeds, and nonbreaking spaces. In this scenario, the Update operation does not update the rich text fields such as the Description and the Rationale.
Insertion: A new requirement was inserted in the requirement set.
Deletion: A previously imported requirement was deleted from the requirement set.
Update: The built-in or custom attribute values of a previously updated requirement were changed.
Move: A requirement was moved in the requirement hierarchy.
Reorder: A requirement was reordered with respect to its sibling requirements.

Before importing requirements into Requirements Toolbox, make sure that your requirements in the requirements document have persistent and unique custom IDs that do not change across document versions. The Update operation otherwise matches unrelated requirements and displays more differences between document versions than actually exist.

Considerations for Microsoft Word Documents

Follow these guidelines when importing requirements from Microsoft^® Word documents:

Use bookmarks for requirement custom IDs. You can then add content to the document while maintaining requirement references. If you use section headings as requirement custom IDs, changing the document can result in unresolved links when updating requirements.
If you import requirements into a requirement set on one computer and update your requirements on a different computer with a different set of fonts or styles installed, additional changes to the requirement descriptions may be tracked. These changes occur because the font or style is embedded in the HTML descriptions of the requirements.
Before you execute update requirements, convert documents that you created in an older version of Microsoft Word to the current version. This conversion prevents Microsoft Word from inserting spurious white spaces in your requirements document.
In Microsoft Word, resolve issues related to the Trust Center or pending updates if you encounter any errors during the Import or Update operations. These issues might cause Microsoft Word to block incoming connections from MATLAB^®.