An Ontological Basis for Design Methods

This paper presents a view of design methods as process artefacts that can be represented using the function-behaviour-structure (FBS) ontology. This view allows identifying five fundamental approaches to methods: black-box, procedural, artefact-centric, formal and managerial approaches. They all describe method structure but emphasise different aspects of it. Capturing these differences addresses common terminological confusions relating to methods. The paper provides an overview of the use of the fundamental method approaches for different purposes in designing. In addition, the FBS ontology is used for developing a notion of prescriptiveness of design methods as an aggregate construct defined along four dimensions: certainty, granularity, flexibility and authority. The work presented in this paper provides an ontological basis for describing, understanding and managing design methods throughout their life cycle. Keywords: Design Methods; Function-Behaviour-Structure (FBS) Ontology; Prescriptive Design Knowledge</p

What Benefits Can Subject-Oriented Process Modeling Bring to the Design of Big Data Applications?

Big data applications usually entail the development of complex IT-systems that collect, combine, analyze, communicate and use large amounts of data from different sources. The interactions between system components can be difficult to understand and describe, due to their large number, heterogeneity, and concurrency (e.g. continuous and discrete processes, or different technologies, may interact). In addition, system changes may occur as a result of new requirements or constraints during the lifecycle of any data processing system. In the system design process, multiple stakeholders need to collaborate and align their individual views of the system, e.g. sensor specialists, hardware designers, IT integrators, operational departments, etc. This alone can be a challenge because different domain experts often have different concerns and use different terminologies and abstraction concepts. Only few of these experts have a system design or modeling background, which can make the elicitation and capture of system knowledge difficult and error-prone. Our research is concerned with the subject-oriented approach to process modeling (S-BPM) (Fleischmann et al. 2012). We argue that it can address the various design challenges arising from the high complexity of big data systems. It has four foundational characteristics that distinguish it from other approaches (Kannengiesser 2017), Figure 1: 1. notational simplicity, 2. widely-shared, intuitive semantics, 3. encapsulation and 4. seamless integration

Rationale in Semi-Structured Processes

Abstract. This paper argues that an explicit account of rationale is essential for the effective management and evolution of semi-structured processes. Our approach is based on a view of semi-structured process models as unfinished products whose design is implicitly completed through their execution by process model users. The resulting refinements and modifications of the process models are instances of user-driven design innovation. Our framework shows how rationale can explain a user’s individual execution decisions, as a basis for process modelers to improve the original process specifications. We propose and illustrate a modeling approach using the FBS ontology

The Internet-of-Things Meets Business Process Management: Mutual Benefits and Challenges

The Internet of Things (IoT) refers to a network of connected devices collecting and exchanging data over the Internet. These things can be artificial or natural, and interact as autonomous agents forming a complex system. In turn, Business Process Management (BPM) was established to analyze, discover, design, implement, execute, monitor and evolve collaborative business processes within and across organizations. While the IoT and BPM have been regarded as separate topics in research and practice, we strongly believe that the management of IoT applications will strongly benefit from BPM concepts, methods and technologies on the one hand; on the other one, the IoT poses challenges that will require enhancements and extensions of the current state-of-the-art in the BPM field. In this paper, we question to what extent these two paradigms can be combined and we discuss the emerging challenges

Key Centre of Design Computing and Cognition

Abstract. This paper proposes an ontological account of Donald Schön’s notion of reflection in the domain of designing. We address two views of this notion: a functional view, describing reflection as the basis of a model of designing as an interactive process, and a mechanistic view, modelling reflection as a precursor of changes in the design. We use the function-behaviour-structure (FBS) ontology to represent both these views. 1. The Notion of Reflection in Designin

An agile process modelling approach for BIM projects

International audienceIn the domain of Building Information Modelling (BIM), the open standardisation of methods for product and process modelling is undertaken by the buildingSMART association. Currently, buildingSMART recommends the use of Business Process Model and Notation (BPMN) for creating process models in Information Delivery Manuals (IDMs). This paper argues that BPMN is closely linked to the waterfall nature of today’s BIM projects, leading to a number of issues including long project durations, lack of stakeholder involvement, and disconnect of processes and data. Subject-oriented Business Process Management (S-BPM) is introduced as an alternative modelling approach for IDMs, based on its support for agile development that has the potential to address the above issues. Specifically, it is shown that S-BPM supports key concepts of agility, including stakeholder involvement, individual creativity, collaboration, rapid prototyping, and iterative design. The increased agility of S-BPM based IDM development can help make BIM projects faster, more flexible and better adapted to the needs of BIM users