Creating Agile Business Systems with Reusable Knowledge

405 Pages·2006·6.28 MB·English

by  A. Mitra

Creating Agile Business Systems with Reusable Knowledge
Agilityandinnovationarenecessarytoacheiveglobalexcellenceandcustomervalueintwenty-first
centurybusiness;yetmostapproachestobusinessprocessengineeringinexistencetodaysacrifice
theseinfavorofoperationalefficiencyandeconomics.Moreover,theITsystemsusedtoautomate
andencapsulatebusinessprocessesareinflexibleandunabletorespondtotheconstantlychanging
businessenvironment.MitraandGuptaprovideinsighttoclosethisgap–theyshowhowinnovation
canbesystematizedwithnormalizedpatternsofinformation,howbusinessprocessesandinformation
systemsmaybetightlyaligned,andhowtheseprocessesandsystemscanbedesignedtoautomatically
adapt to change by re-configuring shared patterns of knowledge. The authors present a modular
approachtobuildingbusinesssystemsthatparallelsthatofobjectorientedsoftware.Theydescribe
howbusinessknowledgecanbeidentified,encapsulated,andshared,aswellashowreusableprocess
modules can be developed to offer the systems flexibility. The book provides practical templates
requiredforacceleratingintegration,analysis,anddesign.MitraandGuptalaythefoundationofa
newparadigminwhichcomputersmanipulatemeanings,notblindsymbols.
Thisbookwillappealtoconsultants,analysts,andmanagersinITfirmslookingtodevelopnew,
moreflexibleproductsfortheirclients.Itwillalsobeofinteresttoresearchersandgraduatestudents
inbusiness,management,andIT.BydeeplyintegratingbusinessknowledgeandprocesseswithIT
systemsdesign,thisbookisavaluableadditiontobothcommunities.
Amit Mitra is Managing Consultant at Headstrong LLC, in addition to President and Principal
Consultant at Sprybiz LLC. He is an alumnus of KPMG and former Chief Methodologist of the
AmericanInternationalGroup.
AmarGupta holds a number of positions at the University of Arizona, Tucson. He is Professor of
Entrepreneurship and MIS; Thomas R. Brown Chair in Management and Technology; and Senior
Director for Research and Business Development at the Eller College of Management; and he is
ProfessorofComputerScienceintheCollegeofScience.Inaddition,heservesasVisitingProfessor,
EngineeringSystemsDivision,CollegeofEngineeringattheMassachusettsInstituteofTechnology
(MIT).

Creating Agile
Business Systems with
Reusable Knowledge
A. Mitra and A. Gupta
cambridge university press
Cambridge, New York, Melbourne, Madrid, Cape Town, Singapore, São Paulo
Cambridge University Press
TheEdinburghBuilding,Cambridgecb22ru,UK
Published in the United States of America by Cambridge University Press, New York
www.cambridge.org
Information on this title: www.cambridge.org/9780521851633
© A. Mitra and A. Gupta 2006
This publication is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception and to the provision of
relevant collective licensing agreements, no reproduction of any part may take place
without the written permission of Cambridge University Press.
First published in print format 2006
isbn-13 978-0-511-25042-2eBook (NetLibrary)
isbn-10 0-511-25042-8 eBook (NetLibrary)
isbn-13 978-0-521-85163-3hardback
isbn-10 0-521-85163-7 hardback
Cambridge University Press has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of urls
for external or third-party internet websites referred to in this publication, and does not
guaranteethatanycontentonsuchwebsitesis,orwillremain,accurateorappropriate.
Idedicatethisbooktomyfather,AjoyMitra,mymother,SevatiMitra,andmy
teachers,whohelpedshapemythoughts,tomywifeSnigdhaandmychildren
TanyaandTrishna,whohelpedshapemylife,andinturnshapethisbook.
AmitMitra
Idedicatethisbooktomymother,mysister(Beena),mywife(Poonam),my
children(AmritandAmita),andtomyteachersinIndia(especiallyatIIT,Kanpur
andIIT,Delhi),theUK(atBirkbeckCollegeandtheImperialCollegeofScience
andTechnology),andtheUS(primarilyatMIT).
AmarGupta

Contents
Listofboxes pageix
Listoffigures xi
Listoftables xiv
Foreword xv
Preface xvii
Acknowledgements xix
Introduction 1
1 Whatisthisbookaboutandwhoshouldreadit? 1
2 Whatwilltheinformationbeusedfor? 2
3 Technology’sbrokenpromise 2
4 Componentreuse–thegenesis 4
5 Scopeofthisbook 6
6 Foundationofknowledgereuse:threepillars 7
7 Howthisbookisorganized 11
1 Onthenatureofrealityandthenatureofbusiness 14
1 Thenatureofknowledge 16
2 Modelingtherealworld 20
3 Metaworldofinformation 21
4 Basicmetaobjectinventory 39
5 Metaobjectsandthenaturalrepositoryofknowledge 39
6 Thearchitectureofknowledgeandthescopeofthe
metamodelinthisbook 43
2 Theobjectattherootofitall 51
1 Objectclassversusobjectinstance 52
2 Thestateofanobject 55
3 Inheritingbehavior–subtypes,supertypes,andpartitioningofobjects 79
4 Theproblemofperspective 94
5 Repositoriesofmeaning 103
vii
viii Contents
3 Thenatureofattributes 112
1 Thestructureofattributesandstates 112
2 Attributeconstraints 122
3 Namingandexpressingattributes 158
4 Domainsandtheirexpression 170
1 Themeaningandarchitectureofformat 172
2 Themeaningofunitsofmeasure 234
3 Domainsofmeaningandthemetamodelofobject 252
4 Storingabstractmeaning 324
Appendix:Keysharedcomponentsofknowledge 327
Bibliography 354
Index 383
Boxes
1 Exampleoftheprocessengineeringvaluechain page5
2 Exampleofamodelforbakingacookie 21
3 Objects,domains,andformats 27
4 Mr.Domain’scalculations 31
5 ConversionbetweenUOMs 35
6 Thearchitectureofknowledge 44
7 Thearchitectureofknowledgereusecanhelpmakeinformationsystems
flexibleandscalable 47
8 Howrulesshiftbetweenbusinessprocessautomationandtechnologylayers 48
9 Businessdefinitionofanobject 51
10 Propertiesofobjects 60
11 States,attributes,statevariables,andtypeindicators:muchadoaboutnothing 60
12 Thestateofasystemisthecollectivestateoftheobjectsitinvolves 66
13 Setmembership 67
14 Objectinstancesmustexistforafiniteperiodoftimeoncetheyarecreated
(oftenforeveraftertheyreachsometerminalstate) 68
15 Mathematicaldefinitionofabusinessobject 71
16 Domainsandmeasuresofdistance 72
17 Statespaceswithqualitativeattributes 75
18 Chaoticbehavior 78
19 Setoperations 81
20 Inheritance,statespace,andpolymorphism 82
21 Exclusionpartitions,variationinheritance,andpolymorphism 86
22 UMLsyntaxforpartitionsandsubtypes 89
23 Subtypingcriteria 93
24 Perspectiveisanobject 96
25 Anexampleoftheproblemofperspective 99
26 Synonymsandhomonyms 101
27 TheOAVmodelandthestructureofattributes 114
28 Componentsofinclusionandexclusionsets 128
29 Thestructureofboundsandranges 133
30 Setversuslist 134
31 Dormantrangesandcontainersforvaluesets 135
ix