Worksheet for
M&S BOK ‘Use Case’ Workshop at
ASTC April 2004
STEP 1 – Form Working Groups
Objective: Organize the Working Group into Teams with common roles with
respect to M&S BOK usage
Activity:
All participants self-subscribe to ‘Government’, ‘Education’,
‘Industry’ or ‘Professional Society’ roles
Q: Are you acting as an agent of the Government? An Educational
institution? Private industry, or one of the Professional Societies such
as SCS, SISO, IEEE, etc.?
A:
Group volunteers into 3-5 person Teams
Q: Who is on your team?
A:
Guidance
Select one or another of your several roles for the ‘game’
Note: many of you have several roles. For consistency sake, your
convenience in ‘acting-out’ the role and our convenience in
interpreting the results of the Use-Case ‘game’, you need to choose
some specific role posture.
Be flexible, other specialized roles are welcome
Note if Govt, Edu, etc don’t provide you enough latitude you can
define your own role in the next section. Remember, however that
it’ll help awfully if the whole team assumes the same role identity
Product: Team membership lists, n teams of 3-5 members
STEP 2 – Identify Role Perspective
Objective: Establish a consensus appreciation of the ‘user role’ that the
Team will adopt and use for the game
Note that a role is normally defined as: – the named designation of a
relationship which may be assigned-to or assumed-by an individual
with respect to some function or organizational entity. Role is
intended to imply requisite authority and concomitant responsibility
to execute the associated functions or to act successfully in relation to
the designated organizational entity. [Webster..."a part or character
assumed by anyone."] [alternatively…The named relationship which
a person has to an organization. A position.
No need to be that formal here – more like ‘who are you’, ‘what do
you do’ and ‘how might you use the M&SBOK if it were available
today to do your job’?
Activity:
Discuss role variants
Q: What alternatives are there for your role? What do you care
about? What doesn’t matter to you? Any special conditions,
constraints, opportunities associated with the subject role?
A:
Capture role attributes, attitudes, interests, needs
Q: What attributes attitudes, interests needs etc. have you agreed
characterize your team’s role? Namely, what are you responsible to
‘decide’ or ‘do’ wherein the M&S BOK could be useful?
A:
Guidance:
Try to establish Team identity and common perspective
Be as explicit in specifying role as seems useful
Don’t worry, you’ll still have room for personal input
Product:
Working consensus
Role specification
Organization Person
Role
+implies execution of
+actions satisf y ing
Function
+implies execution of +actions satisf y ing
Role Function
STEP 3 – Conceive uses or scenarios for use of the M&S BOK
Objective: Establish a consensus appreciation of how you will be using the
M&S BOK – what you will do when you use it
Activity:
Identify (a few) relevant scenarios
Q: How might you use the M&S BOK? For each use, cite:
- Why you’d want it to do execute the specific function?
- What, precisely would you do with it?
- What would be its value?
- What cost risk would accrue if it weren’t available?
A:
Characterize activities and activity-sequences that comprise scenarios
Q: For one or two of the above potential scenarios, tell the story of
how M&BOK might be used. – who does what, with what, to what
effect? This is a little like writing a screen play – Use as much or as
little ‘stage direction’ as you think necessary.
A:
Guidance:
Tell the ‘story’ of using the M&S BOK
Don’t be too formal, but be explicit in order to anticipate Use Case
specification to follow
Use any form of scenario description you find convenient - bullets or
prose descriptions, including all the actors, props, transactions, etc.
Product:
Scenario Specification
STEP 4 – ‘Document’ the Use Case
Objective: Achieve a documented, persistent, and de facto validated Use Case
to support BOK development
Activity:
Generalize scenarios
Q: What general scenario best captures the intended use you imagine.
How can the scenario’s actors, sequence of activities, and
consequences be expressed to be as comprehensive as possible without
loosing the specificity necessary to suggest real uses and, eventually,
real M&S BOK product requirements.
A:
Generate event trace (sequence diagram?) or interaction description
(collaboration diagram?) or both
Q: what sequence of events or interactions captures the essece of your
use case?
A:
Guidance:
Use COTS applications, templates or text description to represent Use
Case
Strive for comprehensive completeness rather than detail
Product:
Use Case specification
Use Case
M&S BOK System
-End1
-End2
Develop M&S BOK
*
*
-End6
BOK Developer
-End5
Use M&S BOK *
*
Actor -End3
M&S BOK User
* -End4
Maintain M&S BOK
*
BOK Custodian
BOK User BOK GUI BOK Data Store BOK Log File
User Query
Acknowledge Query
Log User Query and Acknowledgement
Message3
Log Data request
Data Delivery
Log Data Delivery
Query Response
Log Query Response Delivery
BOK Data Store
Tra nsfer
Data
Message
Log
BOK User(s) Query BOK GUI
Log m
e ssa g e
BOK Log File
STEP 5 – Educe Use Case Implications – so what?
Objective: Capture what you have learned about the desired M&S BOK
while documenting Use Cases
Activity:
Discuss what your Use Case ‘tells’ you about the characteristics of the
desired M&S BOK product … about developing that product, …
about using it, … about maintaining it
Identify any particular evident risks or opportunities
Q: What risks occur to you regarding the specification of the M&S
BOK based on your appreciation of your Use Case? What can go
wrong? What can be done to ameliorate risk to product utility,
program cost or Program schedule?
A:
Capture recommendations
Q: What have you learned about potential use of the M&S BOK?
Q: What characteristics should the M&S BOK exhibit?
Q: How should we proceed to develop the M&S BOK?
Q: How should it be made available for use?
Q: How should it be maintained?
Q: Who should bear responsibility for the M&S BOK?
A:
Guidance:
Don’t try too hard, just get the value out of what you now know
Product:
Comments and recommendations
Step 6 – Brief your Team’s Results
Objective: Communicate and share your findings … identify common and
distinctive findings and areas for further exploration
Activity:
Prepare a briefing in accordance with the template provided
Please answer the following questions in your briefing:
What was your Team’s assumed role?
What uses of the M&S BOK did you explore?
What requirements did you identify for the M&S BOK life-
cycle management
What other interesting findings arose
What recommendations do you have for pursuing M&S BOK
Present your briefing to the other Teams
Guidance:
Keep it informal, collegial, and constructive
Product:
Briefing
Consensus across participating Teams
Team Role M&S BOK Requirements
M&S BOK Workshop
Use-Case:
ASTC ’04
21 April 2004
Team Members:
Use Case(s) M&S BOK Findings MS BOK Recommendations