Bruce,
 
Having worked with EssUp/IJI, the driving force behind this proposal, I
would be very interested in being involved in the discussion.
 
Kind regards,
John

________________________________

From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]]
On Behalf Of Bruce Macisaac
Sent: 08 April 2011 00:24
To: [email protected]
Subject: [epf-dev] SEMAT OMG RFP, EPF response?



Dear EPF community, 

There was a recent submission to OMG to propose a new process standard. 
It is not based on SPEM or any of the work we have done in EPF, but
rather is based on the SEMAT kernel work. 
(For those who don't know this, EPF was originally based on SPEM
http://www.omg.org/spec/SPEM/2.0/ <http://www.omg.org/spec/SPEM/2.0/>  )


Some  reasons given for why the proposal ignores SPEM is: 

1. "lack of enactment support" 
If this is a significant concern, then a set of requirements for what
would be appropriate enactment support should be described in the RFP. 
A goal to what people actually do vs. what they are supposed to do isn't
a sufficient set of requirements. 
There are some hints in the RFP, but they aren't clear: 
"Methods can be queried to get guidance based on where you are and where
you want to go" 
- this seems to be about describing how the processes evolve during
enactment - this could be a natural extension to SPEM 

2."The notion of composable practices is not explicitly defined as a
core concept in the SPEM metamodel" 
This seems to be a gap which could be addressed by a SPEM update.  Note
that both SEMAT and EPF have gone beyond SPEM and 
added support for practices to their method offerings.  They both use
similar concepts and provide similar capabilities, but not identical. 
This kind of divergence is exactly the kind of problem that standards
organizations like OMG strive to avoid, so the time 
is ripe to add practices support to SPEM. 

3. "UML profile ... might be more complex and not as user-friendly as a
more domain-specific language" 
There is also a MOF representation of SPEM, but in any case, any
approach for simplifying is welcome, but doing something completely
unconnected 
doesn't make a lot of sense. 

4. SPEM does not specify a kernel of "essential elements" 
Both SEMAT and EPF define such a kernel, but use different terminology
and have made different choices regarding those essential elements. 
Again, this is where standards are valuable - they align the best of
divergent ideas so that the entire community can benefit. 
The EPF kernel has been defined and publicly available for some time.
It is well supported by both the EPF Composer and Rational Method
Composer tools. 
It is based on an extension to SPEM. 
A natural path forward would be to take the EPF kernel and formalize it
in an extension to SPEM, reconciling differences with the SEMAT kernel
to the benefit of the entire community.  I propose an extension, because
I think SPEM should remain capable of modeling processes that don't use
a kernel, or 
that use alternative kernels. 

If this is a topic that interests you, and you would like to be involved
in this discussion, please drop me a note. 

Bruce MacIsaac
Manager RMC Method Content
[email protected]
408-250-3037 (cell)

Please consider the environment before printing this email.

This message should be regarded as confidential. If you have received this 
email in error please notify the sender and destroy it immediately.
Statements of intent shall only become binding when confirmed in hard copy by 
an authorised signatory.  The contents of this email may relate to dealings 
with other companies within the Detica Limited group of companies.

Detica Limited is registered in England under No: 1337451.

Registered offices: Surrey Research Park, Guildford, Surrey, GU2 7YP, England.

_______________________________________________
epf-dev mailing list
[email protected]
https://dev.eclipse.org/mailman/listinfo/epf-dev

Reply via email to