[Year 12 SofDev] Use Cases, context diagrams

[Claudia Graham]

Hi Mark,

I did teach Use Case text descriptions probably more than the diagrams as I drew on previous knowledge and had also seen them used in commercial documents, I had not seen the diagrams used.

My students did both in their SRS - I worked on  'if you get the text right and you will be able to do the diagram' approach (well in theory anyway!) However the use case description was a little like 'the working out' so not assessed.

My more literate students preferred the text descriptions and of course the visual learners were happy with the diagrams.

In the study design it has 'use cases' as a design tool, but the Area of Study is clear that you must use UML to create the use cases. I have read 'use cases' as text descriptions (a lists of steps), and the UML component as the diagram of the text descriptions. The area of study only asks for Use Case via UML so there would be no requirement for text based use cases in your assessment task.

Regards
Claudia

*********************************************************************
Claudia Graham
VCE Coordinator
9334 0049 (direct)



From: sofdev-bounces at edulists.com.au [mailto:sofdev-bounces at edulists.com.au] On Behalf Of Mark KELLY
Sent: Wednesday, 8 February 2012 1:14 PM
To: Year 12 Software Development Teachers' Mailing List
Subject: Re: [Year 12 SofDev] Use Cases, context diagrams

Thanks, Kevork.

The second link raises an interesting point when it says "For reasons that remain a mystery to me, many people focus on the stick figures and ellipses in use case writing since Jacobson's first book, Object-Oriented Software Engineering (1993) came out, and have neglected to notice that use cases are fundamentally a text form."

I must admit I've mainly stressed use case DIAGRAMS (UCD) with kids and spent little time on the textual descriptions of the use cases in the SRS.  For the simple use cases we handle, I've found the UCD alone conveys all the necessary info, and giving textual use cases as well is mere duplication of the UCD. In the SRS, I tend to gloss over the textual use cases section.  My outcomes last year took this approach and VCAA said nothing about that being a problem when they were audited.

The study design does not give much of a clue about the relative balance of use case text/diagrams, apart from requiring students to know use cases (SD U3O1 KK10) and the composition of an SRS (SD U3O1 KK12).

The detailed example for U3O1 mentions drawing a UCD. The assessment handbook's rubric for U3O1 says that "all relationships between users, the network, including data flows, and the proposed solution are accurately and clearly represented *diagramatically*" (which to me suggests a CD/DFD and a UCD).

Do you guys stress the textual descriptions of use cases in the SRS, or mainly rely on the UCD?

Just curious.

Cheers
Mark

On 8 February 2012 11:16, Kevork Krozian <kevork at edulists.com.au<mailto:kevork at edulists.com.au>> wrote:

Hi Folks,

A couple of really good links covering use cases and context diagrams.
http://searchsoftwarequality.techtarget.com/definition/use-case

http://searchsoftwarequality.techtarget.com/news/1280295/From-use-case-diagrams-to-context-diagrams?asrc=EM_NLN_2495725&track=NL-498&ad=607290&



Kind Regards

Kevork Krozian
Edulists Creator Administrator
www.edulists.com.au<http://www.edulists.com.au><http://www.edulists.com.au>
tel: 0419 356 034<tel:0419%20356%20034>


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