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Using UML To Optimize Your IT Staff’s Work

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Importance Of IT For The Market Value Of A Company

The market value of companies spending the biggest sums of money on IT increases faster than that of the rest of companies

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What Does Your Organization Spend Money On?

People

• Wages and bonuses• Organizational culture development

Hardware

Software

TelecommunicationsA huge part !

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What Could Be Optimized?

Working time costs of IT professionals constitute a significant part of IT budget

Work of IT professionals is not usually standardized IT professionals are one of the most highly salaried

specialists in many countries

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Top 5 Time Thieves

1. Ineffective communication between team members

2. Unclear needs3. Changes in requirements4. Changes in staffing5. Undocumented systems

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1. Ineffective Communication Between Team Members

The instructions of project leader are often vague or incomprehensive

Programmers imagine the system differently and use different notions

No means for recording the work that is already done are used

No unified notation system

Do your project managers and programmers speak the same language and easily understand each other?

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2. Undefined Needs

In order to save time and money we must aim that the developed system would perform ALL the required functions and ONLY the required functions

Do you define and agree with your users/customers on all the system use cases (functions) before starting to develop the system?

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3. Changes In Requirements

Users often see the system for the first time only after it is already developed

Operation of some parts of the system is based rather on the imagination of developers than on the user expectations

Did you ensure that the future users of the systems are involved into the development as early as possible, preferably even before a single line of code is written?

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4. Changes In Staffing

Knowledge leaves the company together with the people

People having knowledge of a particular technology (e.g. DBMS, or any programming language) may be hired in the market, but the knowledge about the systems in your company is usually unique

Did you take care that in the case of IT staff turnover in your company they would leave as much knowledge in the company as possible?

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5. Undocumented Systems

Fixing or developing the undocumented systems equals to working as a taxi driver in a strange city and having no map

Are the systems developed and used in YOUR company documented?

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Global IT Project Statistics

53%

31%

16%

9%

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

Budget or timeoverrun

Terminated On time andwithin budget

On time andwithin budget (inlarge companies)

Source: Standish Group, Chaos Report 2000

Only 16% of IT projectsare successful ! Major part of

them is carried out in large companies!

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Unified Modeling Language (UML)

A Means To Decrease The IT Project Risk And Fight The Time Thieves

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Why do we need UML?

Can you easily understand the following situation?

In order to sign the life insurance contract, a customer must apply to the insurance company or the representative insurance broker. The customer must present data about himself for the insurance agent or broker. If the customer’s age is less than 65 years, it is possible for the the broker to prepare the insurance contract. He introduces the possible insurance parameters for the customer (like monthly payment, insurance sum, additional conditions, e.g. insurance against deadly diseases). After the customer has chosen the desired set of insurance conditions, the insurance agent fills in the insurance policy. If the customer wishes also to be insured against the critical diseases, insurance agent or broker must present additional questionnaire concerning the customer’s state of health. The filled questionnaire is passed to the group of insurance experts, which analyze the customer’s risk group. Depending on the determined risk group there is made a decision on insuring the customer against the critical diseases or not insuring him. If determined risk is too big, the customer is offered to take only the life insurance.

You will see a UML activity diagram drawn on the basis of this situation after few slides.

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Why Do We Need The Maps?

Maps represent the distribution of various physical objects in a particular location. Such representation makes it easy to calculate the distances, to find the location of countries, cities, roads, to understand which direction to drive etc.

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The Value of UML

“ A picture is worth a thousand words, a UML model is worth more than that.”

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“ On my first OO project, I was eager and excited, but (like many programmers) not fully convinced of the value of the newfangled modeling tool we were using. I spent weeks beating my head against the wall of understanding. But after a couple of months, magic happened. I could see the flow of the application. Moreover, I could talk with the other team members in a precise language with a minimum of misunderstanding. It was common to see two or more team members walking over to where they could talk and point at the class diagrams on the wall, since experience had proven that this was the easiest way to communicate their ideas. “

Bill Shannon, Rubicon Technologies, Inc.

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What is UML?

Nine diagrams of various types Visual modeling language Notation standard Unified terminology A way to:

- Visualise- Specify- Document

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UML History

UML was developed by Rational Software company (now IBM) in the middle of 1990s, by the common efforts of Grady Booch, Ivar Jacobson and Jim Raumbaugh (also known as “Three Amigos”)

In November, 1997, UML was standardized by OMG (Object Management Group)

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UML Activity Diagram

Cient

Presents personal data

Chooses preferable insuranceparameters and conditions

Client fills questionnaire on his state of health

Additional questionsconcerning the state ofhealth are givenLife insurance policyis signed

Presents possibletypes of insurance Warns that theinsurance typeis not applicablebecause of age

[Insurance against critical diseases] chosen

[no] [Age< 65]

[No]

[yes]

[Yes]

Remember the situation with insurance broker? Look at the UML activity diagram representing the situation. Isn’t it much more understandable?

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Use Of UML In The World

“de facto” global standard, which gains more and more popularity each year and has no real alternative

35%

17%

0%5%

10%15%20%25%30%35%40%

1997 2002

Source: META Group, 2003

UML users

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Description Of Customer Needs Using UML

Sign transportcivil responsibility

agreement

Sign propertyinsurance agreement

Sign lifeinsurance agreement

Handle the damage Damagehandling

Insurance agent

Client

centre

Look at UML use case diagram representing the previously analyzed insurance situation. It is much more clear than a verbal description.

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Is UML Very Complicated?

The correct question would be:

How much of UML do we need?

“ 80% of problems could be modeled using 20% of UML ”Grady Booch, one of UML developers

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Is UML Designed For IT Professionals ONLY?

NO WAY !!!

UML is the most popular language among the business analysts

Every manager is an analyst of his/her own business

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Research: The Use Of UML To Describe The Business Processes

Rational Unified Process diagrams (UML diagram extensions)

24%

UML use case diagrams 21%Other types of workflow diagrams 16%UML activity diagrams 13%IDS Scheer/ARIS (SAP) diagrams 9%UML various diagrams 6%Rummler-Brache/Proforma diagrams 3%Multiple diagrams 3%IDEF 2%Oracle Designer process diagrams 1%Casewise Corporate Modeler 1%

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Application Of UML In Business

Description of functions of a whole company or its departments

Description of policies and procedures, user manuals Description of business processes both structurally

and dynamically

Even: Modeling of insect populations !

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Advantages Of UML Technology

Easier communication, because everybody uses the same language less time is wasted

Requirements are more easily described and documented less “forgotten” areas

Users are involved into the development of application from the very start less corrections in the end

A means to keep knowledge in a company, even if the people leave the company

Saves time of getting acquainted with already developed systems

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Benefits To Your Company

More effective work of IT professionals because of saving their expensive time

Reduced risk of IT budget overrun Faster and cheaper than that of competitors

development and installation of new IT systems The same technology both for programmers and

business analysts (managers) Effective means for CONTROL of the work of IT

professionals

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The Simplest Way Is To Go With The Leader

Most influential IT companies support and constantly renew the UML standard

More than 100 books on UML use and application All the main drawing, modeling and CASE tools

support UML The most of companies offer UML training and

consulting courses

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Where To Start?

Decide on the problems that will be solved using UML Determine where and for what UML will be used Learn UML Start using it !

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MagicDraw UML – A Leading UML Tool

In October 2002 MagicDraw won two outstanding awards of the U.S. magazine “Java Developer’s Journal” (JDJ), namely:

- Best Java Modeling Tool

- Best Team Development Tool

Supports all UML diagrams, has code generation function for the main programming languages

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http://www.magicdraw.com