What features did you find most useful in CASE Tools?

HI All, It i开发者_如何学Pythons not really a programming related question but definitely programmers'related. If a new Case tool was being developed. What features would you like to see in it which describe behaviour of system in from specification to design.

The basic problem with CASE is that as you proceed through iterations of analysis/design/coding/deployment (or whatever steps you choose) there is an exponential explosion of detail and mapping that needs to be maintained and rationalized among various views of the software system. It is this explosion that defeats every Case tool I have ever come across. They all seem to work well enough moving forward but when faced with reworking some middle level artifact the impacts of the change are very difficult to propagate without breaking something else, which in turn breaks something else and eventually leads to a cascade that becomes unmanageable. The impact cascade is just a logical consequence of exploding relationships as one moves from higher levels of abstraction to lower levels of detail.

Eventually the time/resources spent managing change control/impact within the Case tool exceeds its benefit and we all go back to simple non-Case diagramming/writing tools.

So my advice is to forget trying to build a tightly integrated CASE system. Provide basic diagramming and notational support for UML. Beyond that provide macro capabilities so users can customize behaviour and integrate with other tools used to manage software development.

Finally, keep all the "artifacts" managed by the Case tool in XML, this really opens the door for users to add their own custom processors and xsl to the product.

In the end the true value may not be how much your CASE tool actually does, but the framework that you provide for users to build their own solution.