Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!cs.utexas.edu!sdd.hp.com!decwrl!infopiz!athertn!Atherton.COM!dlw From: dlw@Atherton.COM (David Williams) Newsgroups: comp.software-eng Subject: Re: CASE, the Little Red Hen, and Stone Soup Message-ID: <28966@athertn.Atherton.COM> Date: 17 Aug 90 21:31:38 GMT References: <28596@athertn.Atherton.COM> Sender: news@athertn.Atherton.COM Reply-To: dlw@Atherton.COM (David Williams) Organization: Atherton Technology -- Sunnyvale, CA Lines: 107 In article , jgautier@deimos.ads.com (Jorge Gautier) writes: >>In article <28596@athertn.Atherton.COM> mcgregor@hemlock.Atherton.COM (Scott >>McGregor) writes: >> I am concerned about where our industry is going, or rather where it isn't. >> I am afraid that we are creating lots of capabilities and possibilities and >> few realities and actualities. I am afraid that there will be a backlash >> against what we have done by people who seek for solutions, hear that >> CASE has the answer, look past the possibilities in search of the solutions >> and disappointed turn away, only to criticize the industry as having >> inflated claims. >Anyone who thinks "CASE" is one tool or methodology is being >hopelessly naive. The backlash should be against the specific >companies that are selling useless products. It is not a matter of thinking that CASE is one tool or methodology; it is that when people try and take specific CASE tools and have them work TOGETHER that everything falls apart. In most circumstances you want all the tools you have to be able to share data and you hope this happens via a repository such as the one our company provides as an IPSE. But, most CASE tools are by *design* HOSTILE to data sharing or having their data stored in an OODB rather than in a native file system proprietary file/DB format. When surveys are conducted about what people want out of CASE tools an ultimate goal is for the tools to share (or hey REUSE) their information as the engineer(s) move thru the lifecycle. They become frustrated when they find that unless they have an IPSE that works real hard to provide this magic they don't get this. And so, all CASE tools get tarred with the same brush...right or wrong. What we engineers in the CASE industry need to do is champion the idea of Open Software Subsystems. We need to do what Jef Poskanzer did for graphic file formats (with PBM) and generate a PCF (Portable CASE Format) that is PUBLIC DOMAIN and provided as an option by all vendors and independent developers to facilitate data sharing among CASE tools. Vendors would still be able to have their own proprietary files/formats if they desired...after all it really should be the case that it is their algorithms that provide the functionality (tho in some circumstances elegant data structure + algorithms is what does the magic). In any case if data could be translated into the PCF then another tool could be PCF aware implictly and work with the data or vendors could provide translators that convert to their own format from PCF. Its not enough to have open operating systems (like unix vendors claim to be) we need to have open APPLICATIONS software. I know there are managers and engineers from various CASE/Software Engineering tool companies out there--why don't we get busy on this? We don't need an IEEE standards committee, we just need to talk and DO IT! >> I am afraid that this is the situation for all too many software development >> managers out there. They have too much to worry about to have time to >> spend on figuring out what they want. >Those people then deserve what they get and will get what they deserve. No its not that simple. These people are in trouble, they are a dichotomy to the CASE marketplace--on one hand they would really benefit from the technology and its benefits if all the tools could flow their data thru the lifecyle; we'd really give them some breathing space to do the right thing; on the other hand these folks are fighting to keep their systems and development projects from rigor mortis set in, and if they invest in CASE only to find that it does not give them the advantages they need after taking the hit on ramp up and methodology change you find yourself faced with one very unhappy customer. If CASE tools/environments would actually cooperate these folks would probably be beating down CASE vendor doors to get them. They aren't pain freaks, they are just smart enough to be wary of new things that promise the moon, and significantly impact their ALREADY hellish development schedules/environments. It is their JOB if they invest the companies resources, (money, people, time) and it fails. Being an MIS manager is not a cake walk, I've watched many of them get blown away in the course of trying to do the right thing. >> For many CASE products it is much the same, I think. The real value >> is not in the product, but in the ingredients provided by the customer >> themselves in their customization, self-examinations and preparation >> for use of the new system. The CASE product is merely the catalyst. >If that's how customers want to spend their money, let them. But if I >were a supplier of that kind of product, I would be wondering about >what I'll be selling to them after they wise up. Hmmm, in some cases they just move to another pigeon, ummm customer, in others its like drugs. They've already got a company hooked and now they just say it will all get better in the next release--the management guys who committed all that money to buying their product are not about to risk getting in trouble from their firms management for buying the "bad tool", so they just try and ride it out. Other brave souls just toss the product out and get real cynical about ANY CASE products. >-- >Jorge A. Gautier| "The enemy is at the gate. And the enemy is the human mind >jgautier@ads.com| itself--or lack of it--on this planet." -General Boy ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- David Williams -- dlw@atherton.com -- (408) 734-9822 x291 Atherton Technology -- The Software BackPlane 1333 Bordeaux Drive Sunnyvale, CA 94089 "CASE Environments R US" AIX,SunOS,VMS,Ultrix *