I am back from the Business Rules Forum, last week in Orlando. I have a lot of material to make use of, so I thought I would start with giving an overview of the major points themes of the conference:
- Business Rules has its origins in Expert Systems as well as Data Modeling.
- Business Rules and Business Processes are becoming more integrated than ever. BR approaches can be used to manage the ‘decision diamonds’, and simplify the maps themselves.
- Most common questions: who should document Business Rules? Is it Business Analysts? What is a Business Analyst?... I met a few people who are founding the Jacksonville FL chapter of the IIBA, and mentioned the existence of the IIBA in a few sessions.
- Some participants were evangelists who see Business Rules as the center of business and systems; others see Business Rules as apart but integrated with all the other ‘artifacts’ of business requirements, especially as organized by the Zachman Framework.
- The Zachman Framework was itself a common subject across many presentations, capped by a closing presentation by John Zachman himself. While his framework is methodology and artifact independent, he does however see Business Rules as a valuable addition to the Business Model of Row 2 of the Framework, mainly in the Motivation Column.
To see the overall agenda for the forum, you can visit http://www.businessrulesforum.com/
