From the Technology Reference Model, the Integration SWAT Team guy then began to drill down into the architecture.
“I’ve been working mostly in the Applications, Data and Technology Architectures. I haven’t touched the Business Architectures.” He smiled. I think he’s leaving that for me.
————————–
I wanted to give you an example of what this looks like from our perspective.
Below is an Archimate version (as best as I was able to put together) of a typical basic setup for a training group. This is a high level Application and Data view. I used Archi to put this together.
The top level is your high level application service – ie: what you need your tools to provide.
The second level is the actual functions that the tools deliver.
The third level are the actual tools and applications you are using
The fourth level is the data the tools are producing or accessing.
From here, you start putting together how these things are related.
(Warning, still learning, so you may see an edit to this after I talk to our Archimate guru)
The solid line with the dots = “assigned to”.
If you look at the Online tutorials and LMS link, that would read “LMS is assigned to online tutorials” I added “Trackable tutorials” since we are only putting tutorials that require reporting into our LMS.
The dashed arrow pointing to something = “realizes”.
Look at the dashed arrow between LMS and Content Delivery.
This reads “LMS realizes content delivery”. Or, in more human language, I (the user) can find content in the LMS.
The dotted arrow pointing to something = “access”.
This doesn’t seem quite right and will likely need some review, but it means “LMS accesses LMS reporting”. Which is true in a sense since to allow a user to go back to a bookmark in a tutorial, the LMS will look at the records in its database to determine where that person is.
————–
The nice thing about this view is that it begins to relate what you are actually doing to the tools you are using.
More importantly, it provides us a way to start speaking the language of the folks who need to help us.
—————
A more detailed introduction to Archimate can be found in the Open Group ArchiMate page.
Leave a Reply