IFSR Newsletter 1997 Vol. 16 No. 4 December
The European Software Institute in Bilbao, Spain, mailed a questionnaire about System
Engineering. Here are the definitions they used..Perhaps you would like to comment?
System Engineering
System engineering is concerned with the overall process of defining, developing, verifying, operating, maintaining, and disposing of systems in line with the needs of their different users and the expectations of their customers. It is an interdisciplinary approach to solving problems. Where other engineering disciplines concentrate on the details of individual aspects and technologies of a system (electronics, mechanics, software, human, etc.), system engineering integrates these disciplines in order to facilitate the production of a system that is coherent and effective. System engineering places emphasis on the consideration of the interaction of each part of the system (and the „whole system“) with the environment within which it will be developed, operated and, ultimately, retired from use.
System engineering activities include concept and system definition, requirement definition and management, preliminary („architectural“ and „high-level“) design, risk management and life cycle cost analysis.
Process Model
A definition of a set of interrelated activities that combine together to transform inputs into outputs, achieving a particular objective. A process model usual includes activities that the process should be composed of, work products to be used and produced, and personnel roles required for performance of the process. Attributes are defined for these activities, work products, and roles. For example a process model for achieving the objective of specifying requirements for a new system would contain all the activities to be carried out, the input documents to be used, the output documents to
be produced, and the people that need to be involved.
Generic Process Model
A Generic process model is a process model that is applicable to more than one organization. The definition of the model is abstract, so that it can be used by any organization that needs to achieve the objective addressed by the model. So a generic process model for specifying system requirements could be used by any organization that needs to specify system requirements.
