The Essential Unified Process

Presented In a Radical New Way

The changes to the process go beyond the separation of concerns, presenting the process material itself in a radically new way.

Each practice is presented as a set of process cards that contain the elements you need to build your process, including competencies, activities, and artifacts. The cards help you build and use the process. The card metaphor makes the process itself agile and easy to use. Displayed electronically or presented as physical cards, they are easily manipulated to facilitate process adoption, project planning, and to provide handy reference for practitioners. The cards bring the process to life and make it more visible than a web site or book.

Figure 1 presents samples from the Use-Case Essentials practice. Figure 1(a) is an artifact card, actually a beta, 1(b) an activity card, and 1(c) a competency card. For each kind of card there is a 2-4 page guideline (Figure 2) presenting the most essential information needed to put the cards into practice. They also link into a broader set of references, scripts, tools, templates, and samples. For example, the activity guidelines include an introduction, participant information, completion criteria, and a set of hints and tips with a list of common mistakes to avoid. This information forms the essential information to give you practical advice.

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Figure 2: Guidelines.

(a)

(b)

(c)

Figure 1: (a) Artifact card; (b) activity card; (c) competency card.