Issues for Mailing list of the Business Motivation Model Finalization Task Force

To comment on any of these issues, send email to bmm-ftf@omg.org. (Please include the issue number in the Subject: header, thusly: [Issue ###].) To submit a new issue, send email to issues@omg.org.

List of issues (green=resolved, yellow=pending Board vote, red=unresolved)

List options: All ; Open Issues only; or Closed Issues only

Issue 10090: BMM: UML Associations
Issue 10113: Section: 7, 8, 9
Issue 10583: ection 9 page 64
Issue 10586: Section: 8.5 pages 48 - 50
Issue 10589: Section 8.5
Issue 11510: Restore Primary Reading to "Formulated Based On" Fact Type

Issue 10090: BMM: UML Associations (bmm-ftf)

Click here for this issue's archive. Click here for this issue's attachments.
Source: Business Rules Group (Mr. John Hall, john.hall@modelsys.com johnhallms@hotmail.com)
Nature: Uncategorized Issue
Severity:
Summary:
The BMM as published by the BRG has association names that represent the verb phrases in fact types (except that in a few cases "is" or "has" has been omitted). These have been preserved in the proposed interim specification with the concepts catalog in SBVR Structured English. 
In the UML class model developed for the RFC submission, the verb phrases were added to associations as "ends" (role names). There are two small problems:
·	In many cases they read well as verb-oriented role names but in some cases they do not. 
·	They have been placed on the association connectors at the wrong ends - normally a role name is placed at the line end where the class that plays the role is connected. 
For example, in the fragment below:
Vision is made operative by mission, and amplified by goal. The roles read intuitively with the "clockwise" convention, but reading a UML class model correctly should not depend on positioning. 
Proposal
1) Move the association phrases to the appropriate ends of association lines for them to be role names, e.g.
2) In the UML class model, replace verb-oriented role names with noun-oriented names, if the reading of the model would be improved. For example, replace "goal amplifies vision" with "goal [has the role] amplifier of vision"


3) Where there are necessities in the Concepts Catalog that constrain cardinality, show them explicitly on the UML class model. For example, "mission makes at most one vision operative", "goal amplifies at most one vision". 
4)  Create a mapping of the fact types in the Concepts Catalog to the associations in the UML class model.
Resolution:
To be discussed
Revised Text:
Not yet decided

Disposition:	Open

Resolution: see dtc/2007-08-06 for details http://www.omg.org/cgi-bin/doc?dtc/2007-08-06
Revised Text:
Actions taken:
August 7, 2006: received issue

Issue 10113: Section: 7, 8, 9 (bmm-ftf)

Click
here for this issue's archive.
Source: Business Rules Group (Mr. John Hall, john.hall@modelsys.com johnhallms@hotmail.com)
Nature: Revision
Severity: Significant
Summary:
In response to some SBVR FTF issues, changes have been made to SBVR that affect business rule (adopted from SBVR by BMM) and business policy (adopted from BMM by SBVR). A minor update of BMM is needed to keep it consistent with SBVR Summary of relevant SBVR changes: The resolution of SBVR Issue 9477 caused the verb concept (unary fact type) 'directive is actionable' to be replaced by two verb concepts with narrower definitions: • 'element of guidance is practicable': this is concerned with ensuring that business rules are sufficiently well-defined and precise that they can be put directly into practice. • 'element of governance is directly enforceable': this is concerned with ensuring that violations of operative business rules can be detected and corrected. This separation of concerns is relevant to BMM. If desired results for an enterprise are not being achieved, there could be two causes related to business rules: 1 The enterprise does not have the right business rules. 2 The enterprise and, particularly, the people in the enterprise are not applying the rules correctly. Before challenging whether the business rules are the right ones, it would be important to establish that the rules were being applied as they were intended to be. To establish this, the rules must be enforceable. A resolution of this issue has been drafted, and will be distributed to the BMM FTF when the relevant SBVR changes have been finalized

Resolution: The relevant part of SBVR is illustrated in the following diagram from the SBVR specification: The part of this SBVR fragment that is relevant to BMM is illustrated below. Correspondence between SBVR and BMM Directive BMM Directive and SBVR element of guidance have the same definition: Definition: means that guides, defines, or constrains some aspect of an enterprise. Proposal In BMM, define 'SBVR element of guidance' as a synonym for Directive Business Policy In BMM, Business Policy is a specialization of Directive business policy Definition: directive that is not actionable Note: 'Actionable' means that a person who understands a Directive could observe a relevant situation (including his or her own behavior) and decide directly whether or not the business was complying with that Directive. In contrast to Business Rules, Business Policies are not actionable in that sense. In SBVR, business policy is a specialization of element of governance, which is a specialization of element of guidance. business policy Definition: element of governance that is not directly enforceable whose purpose is to guide an enterprise Note: 'Directly enforceable' means that a person who knows about the element of governance could observe relevant business activity (including his or her own behavior) and decide directly whether or not the business was complying with the element of governance. element of governance Definition: element of guidance that is concerned with directly controlling, influencing, or regulating the actions of an enterprise and the people in it SBVR business policy can be defined as a specialization of BMM Directve (to align with BMM Business Policy) by the following changes to its definition: · Replace the term 'element of governance' with its definition · Replace the term 'element of guidance' with its BMM synonym 'directive' Also, the final phrase ("Whose purpose …") can be removed, because it is covered by the definition of element of governance This results in: business policy Definition: directive that is concerned with directly controlling, influencing, or regulating the actions of an enterprise and the people in it that is not directly enforceable Question Should this definition replace the definition of business policy ("directive that is not actionable") that is in the BMM as adopted? Business Rule In BMM, Business Rule has two definitions, one of which is adopted from SBVR. business rule Definition: directive that is actionable Definition: SBVR: rule that is under business jurisdiction Question If the BMM definition of Business Policy ("directive that is not actionable") is changed, should the (non-adopted) BMM definition of Business Rule be changed to correspond? Also, BMM includes a fact type: tactic effects enforcement level of business rule Synonymous Form: business rule has enforcement level effected by tactic In SBVR, only operative business rules can be enforced, so only they have enforcement levels Question How should this constraint be represented in the BMM? Revised Text: No yet developed
Revised Text:
Actions taken:
August 21, 2006: received issue

Discussion:
deferred


Issue 10583: ection 9 page 64 (bmm-ftf)

Click
here for this issue's archive.
Source: Business Rules Group (Mr. John Hall, john.hall@modelsys.com johnhallms@hotmail.com)
Nature: Enhancement
Severity: Significant
Summary:
Only identifier and description attributes are defined for BMM classes. "Objective" seems to be a special case. It is defined as "... a specific time-targeted, measurable, attainable target". I suggest that additional attributes "date", "unit" and "quantity" be added to "Objective". 

Resolution:
Revised Text:
Actions taken:
January 9, 2007: received issue

Issue 10586: Section: 8.5 pages 48 - 50 (bmm-ftf)

Click
here for this issue's archive.
Source: Business Rules Group (Mr. John Hall, john.hall@modelsys.com johnhallms@hotmail.com)
Nature: Revision
Severity: Significant
Summary:
The placeholder descriptions of "Organization Unit" and "Business Process" need to be updated to be consistent with the latest submissions for OSM and BPDM

Resolution: Extract the relevant model substructures from the OSM and BPDM submissions and describe how the BMM placeholders 'Organization Unit' and 'Business Process' correspond to them. The entries in the specification are valid. They are just not the most up-to-date. Some discussion with the BPDM team is needed
Revised Text: to developed -- deferred
Actions taken:
January 9, 2007: received issue

Issue 10589: Section 8.5 (bmm-ftf)

Click
here for this issue's archive.
Source: Unisys (Mr. David Bridgeland, david.bridgeland@unisys.com)
Nature: Revision
Severity: Minor
Summary:
An organization unit makes an assessment (of an influencer). There are four categories of assessments: strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. So an organization unit "makes" an opportunity. The name of the association---makes---is awkward when the assessment is an opportunity, or a strength, weakness, or threat. "Appraises" is a much more natural term. Then an organizational unit appraises a strength and other organizational unit appraises an assessment.

Resolution:
Revised Text:
Actions taken:
January 11, 2007: received issue

Issue 11510: Restore Primary Reading to "Formulated Based On" Fact Type (bmm-ftf)

Click
here for this issue's archive.
Source: Business Rule Solutions, LLC (Ms. Keri Anderson Healy, keri_ah@mac.com)
Nature: Uncategorized Issue
Severity:
Summary:
Source: BRG
Keri Anderson Healy, Ronald G. Ross
Summary:
The 07-08-06 version of BMM now reflects a 'forward' (primary) reading of a fact type that differs from business intent of this association, as expressed in both the BRG BMM and the prose for this assocation (see 8.2.6 Directive, first paragraph on p. 30 (PDF p. 40)).
It is also possible for the Courses of Action to be formulated based on Directives. For example, the Tactics 'Comply with manufacturer's maintenance schedules' and 'Equalize use of cars across rentals so that mileage is similar for cars of the same car group and age' are both formulated based on the Business Policy 'Depreciation of cars must be minimized'. The Directive thereby serves as the source of the Course of Action.
Given an understanding of how the BRG developed the prose reading of a model, it is clear which reading of this fact type is the intended primary reading.  Here is the mechanistic process that was generally applied:
·	Express the fact type in a prose sentence that states the forward-reading's first concept as the subject, the primary reading phrase as the verb, and the forward-reading's second concept as the object of the sentence.
·	Give example(s).
·	Optionally, state the secondary reading.  (Note:  when the secondary reading is simply the passive form, omit.)
From this, it is evident that the intended forward (primary) reading of this fact type is:
course of action is formulated based on directive
Indeed, this is the way the entry appeared in an early version of Clause 9 (e.g., dated Aug. 22, 2006).
Changing the reading of this fact type to have 'directive' be the subject loses an important part of the business message of what is going on in this part of the model.  There are two potential relationships between a course of action and a directive, each with a different 'subject', to yield a kind of back-and-forth synergy between the concepts.  Depicting the same subject for both fact types loses this part of the message.
Resolution:
Restore the original designation of which reading is "primary" so that both the Concepts Catalog entry and the UML derivitaves are correct and consistent with the prose and the business intent of this fact type.
Revised Text:
In 9.1, p. 59 (PDF p. 69), change the entry that currently reads:
directive is source of course of action
	Synonymous Form course of action is formulated based on directive 
to read:
course of action is formulated based on directive
	Synonymous Form directive is source of course of action 
In 9.4, p. 67 (PDF, p. 77), change the line that currently reads:
directive is source of course of action 	DirectiveIsSourceOfCourseOfAction 
to read:
course of action is formulated based on directive 	CourseOfActionIsFormulatedBasedOnDirective 
In 9.5, p. 68 (PDF, p. 78), change the line that currently reads:
directive is source of course of action 	baseDirective 	derivedCourseOfAction  
to read:
course of action is formulated based on directive  	derivedCourseOfAction	baseDirective 

Resolution:
Revised Text:
Actions taken:
September 23, 2007: received issue