Modelling CASE Environments in Systems Development

Computer Aided Systems Engineering (CASE) envirorunents are pushed into market place daily. Novel features are being added to them, and the area is growing rapidly. However, we lack a more profound understanding of the relationhips between CASE envirorunents and systems development process in general. In this paper we try to make some preliminary steps to bridge this gap. We propose a general framework to analyze and explore systems development process. Using this framework we define the concept of a CASE envirorunent and discuss its role and functions in systems development. Four aspects: organizational, communicational. technical and metalogical are formulated which can be used to identify the effects of CASE upon systems development. The idea of a CASE shell, a design envirorunent for the metalogical aspect and which can be used to "locate" and "program" CASE envirorunents in three other aspects is introduced. We notify 17 dimensions of modifiability in CASE envirorunents and show how these can be used to influence the use of a CASE envirorunents in communicational. organizational and technical aspects. Finally, some research issues raised by our study are discussed.