Application Selection

Definition

Application Selection

the architecting task during which potential new systems or new versions of existing systems are evaluated and selected for development

Classification

As illustrated in the preceding figure, application selection is part of the following inheritance hierarchy:

• Type: Concrete
• Superclass: Task
• Subclasses: None

Responsibilities

The typical responsibilities of the application selection task are to:

• Identify potential applications or versions of applications to select.
• Select the appropriate applications or versions of existing applications to develop.

Preconditions

Application selection can typically begin when the following preconditions hold:

• The business strategy phase has begun.
• The business strategy team has been adequately:
  • Staffed.
  • Trained in application selection.
• The business object modeling task has begun.
• The business process modeling task has begun.

Completion Criteria

Application selection is typically complete when the following postconditions hold:

• New applications have been selected and prioritized for development.
• New versions of existing applications have been selected and prioritized for development.

Steps

Application selection typically involves the following teams performing the following steps in an interative, incremental, parallel, and time-boxed manner:

• Business Strategy Team:
  • Identify existing applications that potentially need new versions developed.
  • Identify potential new applications that should probably be developed.
  • Evaluate these applications.
  • Prioritize these applications.
  • Select applications to develop.

Techniques

Application selection can typically be performed using the following techniques:

• Brainstorming
• Cost/Benefit Analysis
• Cost Estimation
• Cross Functional Teams
• Gap Analysis
• Iteration
• Timeboxing

Work Products

Application selection typically results in the production of all or part of the following work products:

• List of selected applications to be developed

Guidelines

• This task is only needed for business [re]engineering projects.