CASE Tools As information systems (IS) or- ganizations re- tool throughout the 1990s, com- puter-aided soft- ware engineering (CASE) and inte- grated CASE " tools will play a significant role in the process. '. Rather than coding applica-- tions by hand, IS organizations will become increasingly dependent on integrated CASE (I-CASE) tools to gen- erute code automatically from high-level designa specifications. : 'Fhere are only a handful of I-GASE (oolu available today. Since the technolo-.. y is still in its early stages, these tools are incomplete—the offerings lack trace- ability features, as well as the ability to " support GC code, create real:time applica- tions and generate applications that can run in Unix target environments. CASE tools have their roots in the and decomposition diagrams. After a while, it became exceedingly difficult to keep the diagrams current and to verify consistency: across diagram types. Enter the early generation of CASE tools, which primarily automated the production and maintenance of these structured diagrams. The "CASE pio- necr" tools permitted data-flow, decom- posilion and entity-relationship dia- grams to be sketched on the face of the PC. Later, they were expanded to incor- porale automated technigues that veri- fied (he consistency and completeness of the diagrams. ; Now there are more than 200 CASE — PG WEEKNAPPLICATION DEVELOPMENT JY 2. 190 APPLIED INTELLIGENCE To Play a Larg tools on the market, but most do not fully satisfy the demands of a complete application-generation cycle. As shown-in the diagram, non-inte- »grated CASE tools consist of planning, analysis and design workbenches, a de- sign analyzer and a local repository. The workbenches are used to enter design cation. In most cases, (ho codu gonoruled is limited (w screen, report and database: sehemu deflulilons. 'Tho romalning por- tions oč (re opplicatlon—inelneting the speclilcatlan o£ custorlzad procedurul logle—-nukl. be codal hy hanad uslngg un- other produei, sneh us CODOL, Wheu portlons o£ aj upplicallon uro . Components of a Non-Integrateci CASE Tool Design Specificationa Are Divlled. v o v', etuween Potentially Tucompatible Repostturen ," «4 Other hardware plaltorm External code generator PC design analyzer Planner Db workbench | /| workbench | —anlaraloj rojnallaty RI ef O sal] lag gld oa sa genorulo (raginonila ol code lot ačroana reporla un database nI delinillons, . Nives men sa ASA esign. | A|| Parlial code ) Cole generator fragmente? umrenuji Mela Personal computer specifications, in graphical form, into the local repository. The design analyzer checks the specifications for logical con- . sistency and completeness. Several leading non-integrated tools— such as Excelerator from Index Technolo- gy, CASE'Method from Oracle Corp. and 'Teamwork from Cadre Technologies— generale code for fragments of an appli- dl Avaklan coded outside of the DAHIJ tool, two re- positories of design Informatlon are cro- ated; a local repository (hal typlenally stores non-procedural denlyu spoclflcu- tions derived from the plauulug, unuly- sis ani designa workhojeles, un) u vo: positoiy that houses (ho procedural log: ic coded oulside o£ (ho CAH 001. Gencrally, Uhere is no uutomuted Lceh: Pace 45 er Role in IS Organizations uigue to ensure the logical consistency | of (hese two design repositories. The task falls on the shoulders of program managers;, who rely-on manual tech- — | nigues to get the job done. ! 'Fo Cill in (his hole, many non-integrat- ed GAS tools incarporate a bridge to un external code generulor, as shown in the figure. For example, Excelerator has a bridge lo Telon, whleh is used to speci: fy und generule procedural logic; Team- work has u bridge to Ingres, which is used to generute database schemas. "The primary difficulty of this ap proneh is Lhat, once agnin, it results in (ho ercatlon o£ (wo repositorles—design informatlon contalned in (he repository WE (ho CAH (ool, 1uul (he procedura] voda ar dutuboga rehomua generated by (bo oxtornul tool, he now urehlleciure o£ Integrated (AH tools golvex (his problem. These producis uro u sluglo reposilory that is (lghily Integrated with both the front: und desigu fucilitles und a back-end code generator, ECASE tools Uhus are capable of generaling entire applications from design specifications. The result is that they provide the greatest return to the organization for an investment in CASE leehnology. — Next week, I will discuss the compo- nents of CASE tools in. more detail and he significance of these products in re- tooling 18.8 he concepts embodižed in this article are described in the High-Productivity Technology volume in The James Mar- tin Report Series. For more informa- tlon on this volume, call (617) 639- 1958. For information on seminars, contact (in the United States and Can- ada) Technology Transfer Institute, 741 10ih St., Santa Monica, Calif. 90402 (213) 394-8305. In Europe, con- ut Savant, 2 New St., Carnjforth, lancs, LA5 9BX United Kingdom (0524) 734 505. 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