Re: FW: The Technical Writer vs. Agile Development Methodologies

[Tony Markos <ajmarkos -at- yahoo -dot- com>]

--- Dan Goldstein <DGoldstein -at- riverainmedical -dot- com>
wrote:

Hi Tony,
 
What does "the UML techniques strongly retard a focus
on the essential" mean?

Thanks,
 
Dan

Dan:

UML techniques all employ what is commonly referred to
as a force, artificial approach to system partitioning
("chunking" to us TWs).  Basically, with these
techniques, we FIRST draw boxes or ovals or some other
entity, and THEN we try to figure out how they all
interrelate (interconnect).  This is an age-old
analyis mistake (we should have matured beyond this
mentality back in the 80's, but we did not).

When we play the old "connect-the-boxes" game, what we
are doing is putting our limited understanding down on
paper, and then trying to force reality to fit this
flawed understanding.  In other words, we derail the
all important discovery phase of analysis (analysis
is, in the main, a discovery process).

Tom DeMarco wrote that a model based upon the old
"connect-the- boxes" approach is a lie: It looks like
we did a proper discovery phase, but we did not.

And if our discovery phase has been derailed, we lack
a comprehensive, integrated understanding of the whole
which greatly retards our ability to identify the
essential.

Tony Markos
Focused On The Essential Like A Laser

 -----Original Message-----
From: Tony Markos
 
 Gene:
 
I disagree with that article.  The goal is not to
 create simple models - it is to create essential
models.  I worked on a large-scale Agile Development
project where the simple models where but Post It
notes stuck to the bosses door.  Simple - yes, but the
lack of rigor in this approach resulted in a large
number of essential requirements being missed
until much latter in the development process - and
requiring
a 1000 X more time to fix.

The article also specifically espouses use of UML
modeling techniques.  Sorry to say it, but the UML
techniques strongly retard a focus on the essential. 


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