COMET - Business metamodel
Introduction
The business modelling conceptual model and notation describes the concepts used to model a Component Centre product concentrating on its characteristics as they impact on the business it supports.
Structuring concepts
Figure 20 shows the structuring concepts for the business model, which contains the different sub models for a business model.
Figure 20: Top Level Model structure
Basic Business Modelling Concepts
The business supported by a Component Centre product is described in terms of the goals of the business, the processes that are required to meet the goals, the roles in the business, and the resources, which, by fulfilling roles, perform those processes. A community structures groups of resources with common goal. Figure 21 depicts the business concepts and the structural relationship between them, and the following sections describe the concepts.
Figure 21: Basic Conceptual Model
Actor Resource
An Actor Resource is a Resource that performs some behaviour in the model
Artifact Resource
An Artifact Resource is a Resource that is the subject of some behaviour
It specialises the concept Resource.
Behavioural Policy
A behaviour that is necessary to enable the achievement of at least one goal, that cannot, for whatever reason, including modelling purpose, be represented as a set of steps with a defined start point and end points.
It specialises the concept Enabling behaviour.
Business Message
A Business Message is the information or control flow, between 2 roles, that results from a step.
Business Process
A Business Process is an enabling behaviour that is expressed a set of partially ordered steps. A process may itself be considered as a step in some higher order process.
It specialises the concept Enabling behaviour.
Business Rule
A business rule is a declarative constraint or extension to any instance of resource, role or business process, or combination of the three, that has business impact, expressed in natural language.
Community
A Community is a collection of resources working together, in one or more processes, to achieve one or more goals.
Enabled by
Enabled by is a relationship concept that categorises an association in a model between a goal (modelled as a UML class) and an Enabling Behaviour (also modelled as a class) in which the goal is enabled by the associated behaviour.
Enabling behaviour
An Enabling behaviour is what is required to happen for one or more goals to be achieved.
Event
An event represents something that happens in the environment of the business or component being modelled. An event may affect a set of processes and a process may generate events. An occurred event may also have effect on a defined business goal.
It specialises the concept Step.
Goal
A Goal is the purpose that a community has in executing a Business process.
Resource
A resource represents a thing that fulfils a role in the business and can be either an actor for or an artifact in a step of a business process. There are many kinds of resource, e.g. different passive and active resource. One kind of active resource is a business actor, which typically is responsible for a business activity. Work products/ artifacts are examples of passive resources, which typically are input to and output from business steps.
Resource as Artefact
A Resource as Artifact is a representation in the model of the aspects of a Resource that are the subject of a step in a process.
Resource in Role
A Resource in Role is the behaviour of a resource when performing one or more steps in a process.
Role
A role is a name for a behaviour, with a responsibility; represents the behaviour of a resource in performing one or more steps in a business process.
Step
A step is something that happens or is done within a process that contributes toward the achievement of the goal of the process. The resource performing the step may itself be modelled as a community and the step may be considered as a process of that community and, as such, be decomposed into steps.
Work Analysis Refinement Concepts
This section describes the additional business modelling concepts needed to complete a business model so that the IT components can be identified. This activity within business modelling is termed the Work Analysis Refinement Modelling (WARM). WARM refines instances of two basic business modelling concepts, Steps (Figure 22), and Actor Resource (Figure 23).
Business Service
A Business Service is a Resource with a role in the business, and represents an IT element that maps to a Business Service Component in the corresponding Architecture model.
It specialises the concept Actor Resource.
Extended Step
An Extended Step is a Step in which the intermediate states are of interest to the business, and may have to be remembered. This may be either because there are business reasons for such interest, or because other factors, including technology, require that the business be concerned.
An extended step is a candidate for choreography by a Workflow.
It specialises the concept Step.
Figure 22: WARM Concepts – Step
Figure 23: WARM Concepts – Actor Resource
Human (user)
A Human (user) is an actor resource that represents a human that fulfils a role in the Business Process Model.
It specialises the concept Actor Resource.
Human Step
A Human Step is a step performed by a human with no involvement of the Product being modelled.
It specialises the concept Step.
Human/ Tool
A Human/ Tool is an actor resource with a role in the business that is fulfilled by human working with an IT element that maps to a Tool Component in the corresponding Architecture model
It specialises the concept Actor Resource.
Immediate Step
An Immediate Step is a Step that is required to complete as soon as possible, and whose intermediate states are of no concern to the business. It is performed autonomously, with no intervention from a human
An Immediate Step may be mapped to an Operation on a Business Service Component (Process) in the Architecture Model. Each such operation on a Business Service Component in the Architecture will run in an ACID transaction, thereby either completing or leaving state as it was.
The Name of the step is the verb or verb phrase that describes the process (for example, "Modify Customer record"). If a resource is specified as part of the name or description (for example "Modify Customer using Info from Sales Person") then the model should identify the relevant Resources.
It specialises the concept Step.
Other system
An Other System is an actor resource that represents an external automatic system that fulfils a role in the Business Process Model.
It specialises the concept Actor Resource.
Product
A Product is an actor resource that fulfils a role in the business and maps to the executable Product as defined in the CC Information model (q.v.).
It specialises the concept Actor Resource.
System
The System represents the complete IT facility that supports the business including all Products and the Infrastructure.
Tool Step
A Tool Step is a step performed by a human user interacting with a tool that is part of the Product. The human user will use some form of interactive device (e.g. a GUI) to interact with the Product. A Tool Step is a candidate for realisation by a Tool Component.
It specialises the concept Step.
Workflow
A Workflow is an actor resource that maps to a Workflow Definition in a corresponding Architecture model which contains the business logic of a process and determines the sequencing of steps within any instance of that process.
It specialises the concept Actor Resource.
UML profile
The UML profile defines the stereotypes that Combine Component Centre will use for business modelling. These are derived from the conceptual models above.
Figure 24 shows how business modelling (including work analysis) concepts are represented with UML 1.4 metaclasses.
Figure 24: Representing Business Modelling Concepts with UML
Figure 25 shows the stereotypes required and the business modelling concepts they represent.
Figure 25: Stereotypes for Business Modelling