<html>
<!-- 
    Copyright (c) 2005, 2006 IBM Corporation and others.
    All rights reserved. This program and the accompanying materials
    are made available under the terms of the Eclipse Public License v1.0
    which accompanies this distribution, and is available at
    http://www.eclipse.org/legal/epl-v10.html
    Contributors:
    IBM Corporation - initial implementation
-->

<head>
<title>Process Authoring Overview</title>
</head>
<body>
<h3>Process Authoring Overview</h3>
<p>A development process defines sequences of tasks performed by roles and work
  products produced over time.</p>
<p><img src="p.gif"></p>
<p>The figure above shows that processes are typically expressed as workflows
  or breakdown structures. Defining a strict sequence as in a waterfall model
  is as much a process as defining semi-ordered sequences in iterations of parallel
  work. They just represent different development approaches. Hence, for defining
  a process, one can take method content and combine it into structures that specify
  how the work shall be organized over time, to meet the needs of a particular
  type of development project (such as software for a online system versus software
  and hardware for an embedded system). EPF Composer supports processes based on different
  development approaches across many different lifecycle models, including waterfall,
  incremental, and iterative lifecycles. EPF Composer also supports different presentations
  for process, such as work-breakdown structure or workflow presentations. You
  can also define processes in EPF Composer that use a minimal set of method content to
  define processes for agile, self-organizing teams.</p>
<p> The EPF Composer screen capture above shows an example of a process presented as a
  breakdown structure of nested activities as well as a workflow or activity diagram
  for one particular activity, the inception phase. It also indicates with the
  two blue arrows that the particular method content task &quot;Detail a Use Case&quot;
  has been applied in the process twice; firstly in the inception phase under
  the activity &quot;Define the System,&quot; and secondly, in the elaboration
  phase in the activity &quot;Refine the system definition&quot;. You see below
  each of these task applications, referred to as a task descriptors in EPF Composer, lists
  of the performing roles as well as the input and output work products. If you
  look closely, you see that these lists are different for each of these two task
  descriptors, expressing differences in performing the &quot;Detail a Use Case&quot;
  method throughout the lifecycle. You see different roles involved and changes
  in the list of inputs to be considered and outputs to be produced or updated.
  These changes were defined by the author that created this process to express
  the exact focus of the task performance for each occurrence. In addition to
  updating the roles, input and output work products for a task descriptor, you
  can also provide additional textual descriptions as well as define the exact
  steps of the task that should and should not be performed for this particular
  occurrence of the task.</p>
<p>EPF Composer provides you with a process editor that supports different breakdown structure
  views as well as graphical process presentations. As a process author, you typically
  start by creating an activity breakdown, dividing and breaking your process
  down into phases, iterations, and high-level activities. Instead of creating
  your activities in the breakdown structure editor, you can alternatively work
  in a graphical activity diagram editor that allows you to graphically create
  a workflow for your activities. To assign method content to your process, you
  then have the choice of working in different process views (work breakdown structure,
  work product usage, or team allocation view). Each view supports a different
  approach for creating a process. You can define the work to be done, define
  the results to be produced, or define responsibilities for your roles. If requested,
  the editor updates the other process views semi-automatically using wizards
  that prompt you for decisions on selecting method content elements.</p>
<p>For more details on process authoring see the online help:</p>
<div align="left">
<ul>
  <li><a href="http://org.eclipse.ui.intro/showHelpTopic?id=/org.eclipse.epf.help.doc/html/processauthoringoverview.html">Process
  Authoring Overview</a></li>
</ul>
</div>
<p>&nbsp;</p>
</body>
</html>