The Business Side of Objects: Breaking the Barrier between Users and I.T.
Stewart Asbury
Vice President
Byers Engineering Company
6285 Barfield Road
Atlanta, GA 30328
Why use object oriented methods?-
To develop systems that solve real world problems
-
To develop systems that can be maintained and enhanced efficiently
-
To improve the productivity of knowledge workers
-
To improve the productivity of I.T. professionals
-
To avoid the high cost of requirements errors
"A successful software project is one whose deliverables satisfy and possibly exceed the end user's expectations,
was developed in a timely and economical fashion, and is resilient to change and adaptation."
--Grady A. Booth
In essence, object oriented methods attempt to replace the "real world" software evolution process which is
Piecemeal and arbitrary with software design that is intentional, comprehensive, and better supports the enterprise's
business processes.
How does this happen?
The first step in developing a solution is to state the purpose of the system. Next, define the overall domain of the
Problem and catalog all objects, i.e. poles, cables, etc., and behaviors such as engineering design or planning that
are within that scope. Then, all actors (users)are identified and the behaviors(business logic) that are necessary to
perform the work are listed. Information needed to do the job is also identified at this time. Within this context, the
functionality of the system is stated through scenarios called Use Cases and Sequence Diagrams. This
documentation provides the basic elements that define the criteria from which the project' success will be
evaluated. Thus, the result of this exercise is a high-level system requirements document containing the overall
project scope, domain description, and functionality. This also serves as the basis for user acceptance testing.
Once full buy-in has been achieved, sofiware developers take the user specification and look for patterns in the
scenarios. This is then decomposed into a database design (features, properties, and relationships)and a class
definition of system functions (methods such as placing features or querying Jneeded to build the AM/FMIGIS
object model. The classes are documented through application programming interfaces(API's). Business rules are
used to capture the existing expertise and knowledgebase of the most productive workers in the enterprise. These
can be stored in the form of program code as methods, and configured with meta data, subsets of information similar
in theory to an index or card catalog file that is used for locating other, more vast sets of information.
At this stage, you should be using an object-oriented CASE tool like Rational Rose and the Unified Modeling
Language(UML)to document the requirements of the system. This is done by decomposing Use Cases into
Sequence Diagrams that look at workflow, Class Diagrams and ultimately into physical components. This process
ensures that the system design can be traced back to the original requirements. By defining the problems and
opportunities that will be addressed in the use cases, the economics for the business case are also identified and
affirmed.
Objects for the user
An object orientationtowarduser interfacedesign is equally important. This is achievedby performanceof an indepth
interviewingand observationprocessof the end user. Then, one must analyzeand understandhowthe users
are currentlyperformingtheirjobs, andthen anticipatingthe best techniquesfor completingthejob usingnew
technology.
It is essentialto provide a graphicaluser interfacethat the user immediatelyacceptsand feels comfortablewith.
Userdesktop objects(artifacts)are the fi,mctionsthat comprisea set of tools easilyrecognizableto the user, such as
spatialquery, networktrace, etc. Theseuser objects are assembledtogetherto build applicationsthat meetthe
specificneeds of the disparateuser groupswithin the enterprise. Someof the sametools that an engineeruses to
designwork ordersmaybe used in an applicationdesignedfor the long-rangeplanner. By definingthe workflow
for eachtype of user, differentapplicationsare constructedfrom a groupofjimctional components to maximizeeach
user’sproductivity.
