Papers by marcela acosta ruiz
Cornell University - arXiv, Jan 7, 2015
Cornell University - arXiv, May 4, 2012
This report describes and illustrates several modelling techniques proposed by Communication Anal... more This report describes and illustrates several modelling techniques proposed by Communication Analysis; namely Communicative Event Diagram, Message Structures and Event Specification Templates. The Communicative Event Diagram is a business process modelling technique that adopts a communicational perspective by focusing on communicative interactions when describing the organizational work practice, instead of focusing on physical activities 1 ; at this abstraction level, we refer to business activities as communicative events. Message Structures is a technique based on structured text that allows specifying the messages associated to communicative events. Event Specification Templates are a means to organise the requirements concerning a communicative event. This report can be useful to analysts and business process modellers in general, since, according to our industrial experience, it is possible to apply many Communication Analysis concepts, guidelines and criteria to other business process modelling notations such as BPMN [OMG 2011]. Also, Message Structures can complement business process models created with other notations different than Communicative Event Diagram. Most of this work has been included in the PhD thesis of Sergio España [España 2011], and some parts of it have been published in academic publications 2. A platform independent metamodel for Communication Analysis is presented. The metaclasses are not specified in detail; you can find that information in [Ruiz 2011]. Throughout the document, a running example is used. The SuperStationery Co. lab demo is described in full detail in [España, González et al. 2011].
Cornell University - arXiv, Jan 27, 2011
This document is born as an extended version of a paper presented in the 14 th Workshop on Requir... more This document is born as an extended version of a paper presented in the 14 th Workshop on Requirements Engineering (WER 2011). If you intend to cite Message Structures in a scientific paper, please use the following reference: A. González, M. Ruiz, S. España, and Ó. Pastor, "Message Structures: a modelling technique for information systems analysis and design." In: 14th Workshop on Requirements Engineering (WER 1 This technique has been named differently during the evolution of Communication Analysis: Data Acquisition Structures [González 2004; España 2005], Communication Structures [España, González et al. 2009]. We consider that the term Message Structures reflects their essence more appropriately.
Cornell University - arXiv, Mar 18, 2011
Context. Business strategy and intentional factors that drive the information systems development... more Context. Business strategy and intentional factors that drive the information systems development and evolution have been addressed by several conceptual modelling initiatives, mostly from goal modelling and enterprise architecture domains. As agility scales to top executive levels, business strategy becomes adaptive, frequently and objectively assessed, while shapes the structure of the organisation around business capabilities. Problem. On the one hand, modelling several business layer views with EA frameworks to represent business strategy could be a challenging effort under a constantly changing environment. On the other hand, using more lightweight but flexible goal modelling frameworks could hinder the aim of getting well-bounded and repeatable business strategy models. Objective. In this paper, we explore the feasibility of connecting well-defined business strategy models using i* and, by exploiting existing modelling methods and transformation techniques, connect them with b...
Context: Context. Agile organisations continuously change their business strategy with an adaptiv... more Context: Context. Agile organisations continuously change their business strategy with an adaptive, outside-in perspective to align their goals, structure, and supporting information systems. Conceptual modelling for strategy and systems alignment has been tackled by enterprise architecture and goal modelling frameworks, however, these approaches require expensive modelling efforts and lack precise modelling procedures that hinder its use in agile, model-driven software development processes. Objective. We present LiteStrat, a lightweight modelling language and procedure for business strategy. Method. LiteStrat was designed by assembling concepts from existing enterprise architecture and goal frameworks. An experimental evaluation is presented to explore improvements over a reference goal modelling framework. Results Significant accuracy improvements for representing business strategy concepts were found, without affecting complexity, efficiency, and subjects' satisfaction. Conclusions. The adaptive, domainaccurate, and lightweight approach of LiteStrat to model business strategy serve as a basis for its integration with business process and system models in an MDD context.
Context. Situational Method Engineering (SME) is the discipline that aims at the systematic defin... more Context. Situational Method Engineering (SME) is the discipline that aims at the systematic definition of methods adapted to specific contexts of use (situations). The use of goal-oriented methods for supporting SME is an active research line where the iStar 2.0 language is applied. Objective. We plan to conduct an experiment to investigate some designated pragmatic qualities, namely the perceived usefulness, ease of use and accuracy of iStar 2.0 when used in the SME context. Method. This paper presents our current work on designing an empirical study for the use of iStar 2.0 in SME. Next steps. We plan to refine our current study and run pilots until our measurement tools and sample population are ready for experimental execution.
Conceptual Modeling, 2021
Most computer science curricula include a compulsory course on data structures. Students are pron... more Most computer science curricula include a compulsory course on data structures. Students are prone to memorise facts about data structures instead of understanding the essence of underlying concepts. This can be explained by the fact that learning the basics of each data structure, the difference with each other, and the adequacy of each of them to the most appropriate context of use, is far from trivial. This paper explores the idea of providing adequate levels of abstractions to describe data structures from an intentional point of view. Our hypothesis is that adopting a goal-oriented perspective could emphasise the main goals of each data structure, its qualities, and its relationships with the potential context of use. Following this hypothesis, in this paper we present the use of iStar2.0 to teach and understand data structures. We conducted a comparative quasi-experiment with undergraduate students to evaluate the effectiveness of the approach. Significant results show the great potential of goal modeling for teaching technical courses like data structures. We conclude this paper by reflecting on further teaching and conceptual modeling research to be conducted in this field.
Complex Systems Informatics and Modeling Quarterly, 2017
Novice innovators and entrepreneurs face the risk of designing naive business models. In fact, la... more Novice innovators and entrepreneurs face the risk of designing naive business models. In fact, lack of viability in business models is perceived to be a major threat for the start-up success. Both the literature and the responses we gathered from experts in incubation present evidences of this problem. The LightCDD method helps entrepreneurs in the analysis, design and specification of start-ups that are context aware and adaptive to contextual changes and evolution. In this article we describe the LightCDD method, a context-aware enterprise modeling method that is tailored for business model generation. The LightCDD applies a lightweight Capability-Driven Development (CDD) methodology. It reduces the set of modeling constructs and guidelines to facilitate its adoption by entrepreneurs, yet keeping it expressive enough for their purposes and, at the same time, compatible with the CDD methodology. We provide a booklet with the LightCDD method for start-ups development. The feasibility of the LightCDD method is validated by means of its application to one start-up development case. From a practitioner viewpoint (entrepreneurs and experts in incubation), it is important to provide integrative modeling perspectives to specify business ideas, but it is vital to keep it light. The LightCDD is giving a step forward in this direction. From a researcher point of view, the LightCDD booklet facilitates the application of LightCDD to different start-up development cases. The feasibility validation has produced important feedback for further empirical validation exercises in which is necessary to study the scalability and sensitivity of LightCDD.
This technical report presents the variables, hypotheses, instrumentation and statistical results... more This technical report presents the variables, hypotheses, instrumentation and statistical results corresponding to a controlled experiment performed for the evaluation of the iStar2ca guidelines.
This report describes de integration of two requirements engineering methods; namely, i*, a goal-... more This report describes de integration of two requirements engineering methods; namely, i*, a goal-oriented requirements engineering method [Yu and Mylopoulos 1994], and Communication Analysis, a communication- oriented business process modelling and requirements engineering method [España, González et al. 2009]. This work is intended to offer an integrated method that takes advantage of the intentional perspective of i* and the communicational perspective of Communication Analysis. Joint together, we expect that analysts can start an engineering project (or a reengineering project) by analysing organisational goals and then reason a business process model that supports those goals. An overview of both methods is offered in Section 1, but they are not described in full detail; refer to the literature for more information about the methods.
Information Systems, 2015
Context: Organisational reengineering, continuous process improvement, alignment among complement... more Context: Organisational reengineering, continuous process improvement, alignment among complementary analysis perspectives, and information traceability are some current motivations to promote investment and scientific effort for integrating goal and business process perspectives. Providing support to integrate information systems analysis becomes a challenge in this complex setting. Objective: The GoBIS framework integrates two goal and business process modelling approaches: i n (a goal-oriented modelling method) and Communication Analysis (a communication-oriented business process modelling method). Method: In this paper, we describe the methodological integration of both methods with the aim of fulfilling several criteria: i) to rely on appropriate theories; ii) to provide abstract and concrete syntaxes; iii) to provide scenarios of application; iv) to develop tool support; v) to provide demonstrable benefits to potential adopters. Results: We provide guidelines for using the two modelling methods in a top-down analysis scenario. The guidelines are validated by means of a comparative experiment and a focus-group session with students. Conclusions: From a practitioner viewpoint (modeller and/or analyst), the guidelines facilitate the traceability between goal and business process models, the experimental results highlight the benefits of GoBIS in performance and usability perceptions, and demonstrate an improvement on the completeness of the latter having an impact on efficiency. From a researcher perspective, the validation has produced useful feedback for future research.
Models are now part of an increasing number of engineering processes. However, in most cases, the... more Models are now part of an increasing number of engineering processes. However, in most cases, they are confined to a simple documentation role instead of being actively integrated into the engineering process. The model-driven development approach considers models as first-class entities and also considers tools, repositories, etc. as models. In order to take full advantage of these ideas, model transformation emerges as a main activity. Model transformation aims at supporting the production of target models from a number of source models. Following the model-driven development paradigm, we propose a model-driven framework to integrate Communication Analysis (a communication-oriented business process modelling and requirements method) and OO-Method (an object-oriented model-driven development method). This integration framework is composed of two stages: diagramming support and transformation support. This paper describes the second stage (the first stage was described in previous works). Phases, tasks, technological support and examples are presented. Finally, we conclude with an analysis and discussions about lessons learned and an evaluation proposal to assess the usability of the transformation module.
2012 Sixth International Conference on Research Challenges in Information Science (RCIS), 2012
ABSTRACT There is an open challenge in the area of model-driven requirements engineering. Model t... more ABSTRACT There is an open challenge in the area of model-driven requirements engineering. Model transformations that allow deriving (platform-independent) conceptual models from (computation-independent) requirements models are being proposed. However, rigorous assessments of the quality of the resulting conceptual models are needed. This paper reports a controlled experiment that compares the performance of subjects applying two different techniques for deriving object-oriented, UML-compliant conceptual models. We compare the quality of the OO-Method conceptual models obtained by applying a text-based derivation technique (which mimics what OO-Method practitioners actually do in real projects) with the quality obtained by applying a novel communication-based derivation technique (which takes as input Communication Analysis requirements models). The results show that there is an interaction between the derivation technique and the OO-Method modelling competence of the subject: the derivation technique has a significant impact on model completeness within the high-competence group. No impact has been observed on model validity. We also discuss new challenges raised by the evaluation.
Communications in Computer and Information Science, 2013
ABSTRACT Models play a paramount role in model-driven development (MDD): several modelling layers... more ABSTRACT Models play a paramount role in model-driven development (MDD): several modelling layers allow defining views of the system under construction at different abstraction levels, and model transformations facilitate the transition from one layer to the other. However, how to effectively integrate requirements engineering within model-driven development is still an open research challenge. This paper shows a full MDD approach that covers from requirements engineering to automatic software code generation. This has been achieved by the integration of two methods: Communication Analysis (a communication-oriented requirements engineering method [1]) and the OO Method (a model-driven object-oriented software development method [2]). For this purpose, we have proposed a systematic technique for deriving conceptual models from from business process and requirements models; it allows deriving class diagrams, state-transition diagrams and specifications of class service behaviour. The approach has been evaluated by means of an ontological evaluation, lab demos and controlled experiments; we are currently planning apply it under conditions of practice in an action research endeavour.
2011 FIFTH INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON RESEARCH CHALLENGES IN INFORMATION SCIENCE, 2011
Abstract Model-driven development (MDD) is a promising paradigm for enterprise information system... more Abstract Model-driven development (MDD) is a promising paradigm for enterprise information systems. However, an open research challenge is to successfully integrate requirements practices into the MDD software lifecycle, and an open industrial challenge ...
Lecture Notes in Business Information Processing, 2011
Enterprise information systems can be developed following a modeldriven paradigm. This way, model... more Enterprise information systems can be developed following a modeldriven paradigm. This way, models that represent the organisational work practice are used to produce models that represent the information system. Current software development methods are starting to provide guidelines for the construction of conceptual models, taking as input requirements models. This paper proposes the integration of two methods: Communication Analysis (a communication-oriented requirements engineering method [1]) and the OO-Method (a model-driven object-oriented software development method [2]). For this purpose, a systematic technique for deriving class diagrams from business process models is proposed. The business process specifications (which include message structures) are processed in order to obtain class diagram views, which are integrated to create the class diagram incrementally. Then, using the OLIVANOVA framework, software source code can be generated automatically. The paper also discusses the advantages and current limitations of the technique. Results show that, although there is room for improvement, the technique is feasible and it does facilitate the creation of the class diagram.
IEEE 7th International Conference on Research Challenges in Information Science (RCIS), 2013
ABSTRACT Enterprise systems need to evolve to be adapted with changes in their context. Model-dri... more ABSTRACT Enterprise systems need to evolve to be adapted with changes in their context. Model-driven reengineering frameworks have been developed in order to support post-delivery life cycle activities and software system maintenance (for instance, architecture-driven modernisation is an object management group initiative). However, existing proposals are general purpose and full support for an organisational reengineering framework is still needed. This paper presents a research effort aiming at designing and developing guidelines and tools for supporting model-driven organisational improvement. We propose to support model evolution by means of two artefacts: a pattern definition metamodel and an evolution metamodel. As a proof of concept, this paper applies the proposal to support business process evolution. We illustrate an instance of these metamodels by means of a laboratory-demo. We also discuss benefits and limitations of our proposal.
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Papers by marcela acosta ruiz