Tool Mentor: Defining a Custom Process Using Rational Process Workbench

Tool Mentors > Rational Process Workbench Tool Mentors > Defining a Custom Process Using Rational Process Workbench

Purpose

This tool mentor describes how to define your custom process using the Rational Unified Process (RUP) process model and the Process Content Library as the starting point for your customized RUP.

This tool mentor relates to the following RUP information:

Overview

You can customize the process model, component model, and Process Content Library included with the RUP to your specific needs using the Rational Process Workbench (RPW). This work entails defining new process elements, either right from the very beginning or derived from existing RUP elements, authoring their associated process text, and specifying the closure of your process.

Tool Steps

To define a custom process, proceed as follows:

Create your own process model
Author your process text
Organize your Process Content Library
Create your own process components
Define your own process closure
Define how the published tree browser will be organized
Upgrade to a new version of the RUP

1. Create your own process Model

Essentially, a process model is a stereotyped package that resides at the top-level in the Rational Rose workspace's Logical View. Process models serve as containers of process definitions and you can have multiple process model packages simultaneously loaded in the same Rose workspace. This allows you to view and share information between the various process models.

Your process customizations are developed in your own process models, where they are separate from the RUP definitions, which are kept in another process model. This separation facilitates future updates to the RUP.

You work inside the process model, where you use the notation of RPW to define new process elements that support your specific process needs.

See the chapter titled " Modeling elements and principles" in the Developing Process Using Rational Process Workbench manual.

In addition to creating new elements, using the object-oriented extension mechanism of inheritance you can derive new process elements from existing ones in the RUP, and you can create variations points using interfaces.

Refer to the topic titled Creating your own process model in RPW online Help for detailed information.

2. Author your process text

Each process element in your process model is accompanied by one or more HTML files that constitute the element's process text.

Process text is maintained in the file system as regular HTML pages and you can use your preferred HTML editor to author the text. RPW enables you to create new process text files using templates, which populate your new files with their initial structure. This includes inserting the required RPW constructs in the HTML material, which are the foundation for generating the process, as well as creating the initial outline for your new file.

RPW is only involved in the initial creation of the process text, therefore, you may prefer to invoke your HTML editor from outside of the RPW environment.

Use the Process Content Files dialog to create files for the different element types. The dialog is tailored to recognize the various file types defined for each process element type.

See Chapter 3, " Process Content Libraries" in the Developing Process Using Rational Process Workbench manual for a complete description of the types of files that can be defined for the different types of process elements.

Refer to the topic titled Authoring your own Process Text in the Rational Process Workbench online Help for detailed information.

3. Organize your Process Content Library

Your Process Content Library (PCL) stores the many files that provide the process text, graphics, icons, and so on, for your process Web site. To facilitate the incorporation of future updates of the RUP, you must maintain your own process text in its own PCL, separate from the RUP material.

Although RPW does not impose any particular organization of your PCL, it does require that some information exists there to operate correctly.

Refer to the topic titled Organizing your own Process Content Library in the Rational Process Workbench online Help for detailed information.

4. Create your own process components

When you've defined your customized process elements and created their accompanying process content files, it's time to create the process components that specify how these elements will be grouped together for publishing. See Tool Mentor: Publishing a Process for more details.

The component view in Rose is used to define both process components and process closures. RPW uses regular components stereotyped to process components, and uses their realization properties to specify those process elements to include.

Refer to the topic titled Creating your own process components in the Rational Process Workbench online Help for detailed information.

5. Define your own process closure

A process is represented by a stereotyped component in Rose's component view, which is associated with the process components included in the process. A component model can contain several processes at the same time, including different, overlapping subsets of the collection of defined process components.

A process closure is determined by the process elements associated to those process components included in the process. It's a transitive closure, meaning that all process elements associated to already included process elements are also included. For a process closure to be considered complete and correct, all associated elements need to exist inside of its closure. This is a prerequisite for publishing a process. See Tool Mentor: Publishing a Process for more details.

Refer to the topic titled Defining your own process closure in RPW online Help for detailed information.

6. Define how the published tree browser will be organized

You can control how the published tree browser is organized in the four predefined compartments into which published information is inserted—namely the Disciplines, Roles, Artifacts, and Tools sections—by using a <<tree node>> package stereotype to structure the process elements in your process model. This stereotyped package type may exist in arbitrary structures, which contain process elements, in your process model. When published, the structure of Tree Node packages is preserved for each process element and is superimposed on the existing structure in its designated compartment in the tree browser.

Additionally, you can override a published tree browser organization, which defaults to be ordered alphabetically, with your own preferred order. Such rearrangements are preserved over subsequent generations into the same location.

Those portions outside of the four predefined compartments of the tree browser are configured by editing a text file, instead of from the modeling space. See Tool Mentor: Publishing a Process for more details.

Refer to the topic titled Defining how the published tree browser will be organized in RPW online Help for detailed information.

7. Upgrade to a new version of the RUP

New versions of the RUP are released at regular intervals. If you've followed our recommendations to keep your customized process models and content library separate from the base RUP material, merging a new version of the RUP with your customized material is straightforward.

To upgrade to a new RUP version, you need to bring the new process model into your Rose workspace, synchronize it with your customized process elements, connect the new RUP process model with its accompanying content library, and capture and reestablish your component realization from the RUP process model. A combination of Rose and RPW functions support you in determining if a received process model is compatible with its predecessor and, if not, where the differences exist, and reestablish your realization dependencies.

Refer to the topic titled Upgrading to a new version of the RUP in RPW online Help for detailed information.

For More Information

For more information on basic modeling principles, see Chapter 2, Modeling Elements and Principles in the Developing Process Using Rational Process Workbench manual.

Rational Unified Process