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| changeDate="2007-07-12T14:47:43.284-0700"> |
| <mainDescription><p>
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| A <a class="elementLink" href="./../../base_concepts/guidances/termdefinitions/discipline_7667F451.html" guid="_yGUuidnmEdmO6L4XMImrsA">discipline</a> is a collection of <a class="elementLinkWithUserText" href="./../../base_concepts/guidances/termdefinitions/task_6C1FF051.html" guid="_x459ktnmEdmO6L4XMImrsA">tasks</a> that are
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| related to a major "area of concern" within the overall project. Grouping tasks into disciplines is mainly an aid to
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| understanding the project from a traditional waterfall perspective. Although it is more common to perform tasks
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| concurrently across several disciplines (for example, certain requirements tasks are performed in close coordination
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| with analysis and design tasks), separating these tasks into distinct disciplines is simply an effective way to
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| organize content, which makes comprehension easier.
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| </p>
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| <p>
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| Another reason that several tasks are all categorized by the same discipline is that they represent a part in achieving
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| a higher goal, or performing work tasks that are all related to each other. Every discipline defines standard ways of
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| doing the work it categorizes. Such standard ways are expressed by so-called <b>reference workflows</b> described with
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| <a class="elementLink" href="./../../base_concepts/guidances/termdefinitions/capability_pattern_F5DDC5F.html" guid="_2RUJACO4EdqaNq6Ptg8uyA">capability pattern</a>s, which define how the tasks categorized by the discipline work
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| together (in the most generic way). These reference workflows are often used for educating and teaching practitioners.
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| </p>
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| <p>
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| Like other workflows, a discipline's reference workflow is a semi-ordered sequence of activities, presented as either a
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| breakdown structure or an activity diagram performed to achieve a particular result. The "semi-ordered" nature of
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| discipline workflows emphasizes that the discipline workflows cannot present the real nuances of scheduling real work,
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| for they cannot depict the optionality of activities, or the iterative nature of real projects. Yet they still have
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| value as a way for us to understand the process, by breaking it into smaller areas of concern.
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| </p></mainDescription> |
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