Words of Wisdom
• Treat time as the most precious resource.
Software Requirements Engineering
Week 4
Business Modeling
• Business modeling is a problem analysis technique especially
suitable for the IS environment
• In a complex business environment one needs to understand
some of this complexity before even attempting to define a
specific problem worth solving
• Business environment consists of organizations, business units,
departments, functions, IT infrastructure, customers, users,
human resources, material requirement planning systems
(MRP), inventory, management systems, and more
• We must understand the broader context in which the
application operates.
Money spent can be earned back but not the
time.
• Before worrying to do something ask yourself:
“Is this something I should be doing at the first
place?”
• It is the excellence of a man’s faith that he gives
up meaningless work. (Tirmidhiy, Ibni Majah,
Ahmed)
• We need to answer following questions
– Why build a system at all?
– Where should it be located?
– How can we determine what functionality is optimum to locate on a
particular system?
– When should we use manual-processing steps or workarounds?
– When should we consider restructuring the organization itself in order
to solve the problem?
• Business Modeling is ideally suited to address this particular
problem
1
 Business Models Provide Input to
Why Business Modeling? Systems
• From a business perspective, a business model may be used to: • What should business models show?
– Understand structure and dynamics of the organization
• Structure?
– Business Processes  Products
• Dynamics? – Organizational structure  Deliveries
– Visualize the organization and its processes  Events
– Roles and responsibilities
– Find ways to make the organization more efficient
– Re-engineer the organization
– Provide proof that the information technology adds value

• To ensure that customers, end users, and developers have a

common understanding of the organization
– Common understanding?

• A good understanding of business processes helps you to build

the right systems.

Business Modeling Workflow Workers

• Business-process analyst
– leads and coordinates business use-case modeling by outlining and delimiting
the organization being modeled.
• E.g., the business-process analyst establishes which business actors and business use
Capture a Common Find Business Structure the cases exist and how they interact.
Vocabulary Actors and Business
Use Cases Use Case Model • The business designer
Business Business
Process Model – details the specification of a part of the organization by describing the workflow
Analyst Reviewer of one or several business use cases.
– specifies the business workers and business entities needed to realize a business
use case to these business entities.
– defines the responsibilities, operation, attributes, and relationships of one or
several business workers and business entities.
Describe Review
a Business Business • Stakeholders
Use Case Describe a Use-Case Model – who represent various parts of the organization and provide input and review
Business Worker
Find • The business reviewer
Business Business Workers – who reviews the resulting artifacts
Designer and Entities Review
Business
Object Model
Describe a
Business Entity

2
 Artifacts
• A business use-case Model
– a model of the business's intended functions.
– It is used as an essential input to identify roles and deliverables in the
organization.
• A business object model
– an object model describing the of business use cases
• Supplementary business specifications
– This document presents any necessary definitions of the business not
included in the business use-case model or the business object model.
• A glossary defines important terms used in the business.

Business Modeling using UML Business Use Case

• Two key modeling constructs • “A business use case describes how a business actor
– Business use case model
– Business object model uses a business to achieve a goal and what the
• Business use-case model business does for the business actor to achieve that
– A model of the indented functions of the business goal.”
– Describes who is involved in the business activities and how these
activities take place • “It tells the story of how the business and its actors
– Used to identify roles and deliverables in the organization
– Model consists of
collaborate to deliver something of value for at least
• Actors – users and systems that interact with the business one of the actors.”
• Use Cases – sequences of events by which the actors interact with the
business elements to get their job done • “… is independent of the concrete possibilities and
requirements for its (IT-related) implementation.”
• *Developing Software with UML: Object-Oriented Analysis and Design in Practice, Bernard Oestereich

3
 BUC Diagram/model BUC Diagram/model
• “A model of a business (defined in terms of • What is a Business Use Case?
– A business process that
business use cases, business actors, and the happens within an Rent a Video

associations between them) that describes the organization

requirements of a business.” Use Case Modeling, by Bittner & Spence

• What is an Actor?
– Someone who interacts with
the business process Cus tomer

• Business Use Case Diagram

Example
Custome r Rent A Video

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a business use-case model of an

Business Object Model
order management organization
• The business object model is an object model
describing the realization of business use cases.

• Entities
– Workers
• Accountant
– Business Entity
• paychecks, invoices
• Entities interactions to deliver the functionality

4
 Business Model to Systems Model
• Business workers will become actors to the system we
are developing
• Behaviors described for business workers are things
that can be automated, so they help us find the
systems use cases and define needed functionality
• Business entities are things we may want the system
to help us maintain, so they help us find entity classes
in the analysis model of the system

Systems Engineering
• Business Applications VS embedded systems • Systems engineering helps us understand the requirements
• Domains consists of connectors and power supplies, that are going to be imposed on any software application that
electronic and electrical components, hydraulic and run within the solution system
fluidic handling devices, other software systems, • Complex systems are decompose into subsystems (which may
mechanical subsystems even further decomposed)
• Systems Engineering is an interdisciplinary approach • Each subsystem is analyzed, designed and manufactured
and means to enable the realization of successful • All subsystem and integrated (composed) to produced solution
systems system
– It focuses on defining customer needs and required
functionality early in the development cycle
– It considers both the business and the technical needs of
all customers with the goal of providing a quality product
that meets the needs of the user

5
 System Engineering Focus
• Distribution and partitioning of functionality are optimized to achieve the
overall functionality of the system with minimal cost and maximum
flexibility
• Each subsystem can be defined, designed, and built by a small or at least
modest-sized team
• Each subsystem can be manufactured within the physical constraints and
technologies of the available manufacturing processes
Q&A
• Each subsystem can be reliably tested as a subsystem, subject to the
availability of suitable fixtures and harnesses that simulate the interfaces to
the other system
• Appropriate deference is given to physical domain