Unified Process: An Adaptive Methodology for Information Systems

This report focuses on the Unified Process (UP), an adaptive methodology suitable for developing the information system for Comfort Quits Limited. The report begins with an introduction to adaptive methodologies, highlighting their advantages over traditional predictive approaches, particularly in adapting to changing organizational needs and ensuring customer satisfaction. The UP is presented as an architecture-centric, use-case driven, and iterative framework that leverages the Unified Modeling Language (UML). The report details the key features of UP, including its component-based approach, use of UML for modeling, and use-case driven design. The UP's incremental and iterative design process, which is divided into four phases: Inception, Elaboration, Construction, and Transition, is also thoroughly explained. Each phase, along with its objectives and major milestones, is described, emphasizing the importance of these milestones in evaluating project progress. The report concludes by asserting the UP's suitability for Comfort Quits Limited, emphasizing its ability to facilitate future system maintenance through improved documentation.

Part A
Introduction
Adaptive methodologies are systematic and structured and systematic project management processes
that allow gradual improvement of the practices and decisions that are made during the development of
a project, by learning from the outcomes of the decisions that were taken in the previous phases of the
project. Project management is a continuous process which is usually divided into phases upon which
decisions have to be made on each phase. Adaptive methodologies were introduced to compliment the
traditional predictive methodologies which were based on making a project plan which was strictly
followed by the development team (Freedman, 2010). Adaptive methodologies were introduced to
adapt to the needs of the organization thus leading higher levels of customer satisfaction. Comfort Quits
Limited believes that use of an adaptive methodology to develop their information system is the best
approach as adaptive methodologies are designed and formulated to adapt to changes while
encouraging continuous learning throughout the process to make sure the needs of the customer are
fulfilled. There are many types of adaptive methodologies but this report focuses on The Unified Process
(UP) (Mrsic, 2016).
The Unified Process (UP)
The unified process is an adaptive methodology which follows all the basic principles of adaptive
methodology as discussed above but has an architecture-centric approach of developing the system in
increments. UP is a use-case driven and iterative framework which uses the Unified Modelling language
to model the architecture of the proposed system (Alhir, 2001). The Unified process is suitable for large-
scale projects and small scale projects like the Comfort Quits Limited Information system. The unified
process has the following key features that distinguish it from other adaptive methodologies;
 Unified process is component based as it at most times used to coordinate projects that are
developed using the object oriented approach. The component based approach of developing
the system means that some of the components will be reusable with minimal modifications or
customizations of the components. The reuse factor of different components gives the
development team a chance to focus on the problem and the requirements of the client while
spending less time on building of new components
 It uses the Unified Modelling Language (UML) which is a diagrammatic type of notation of
modelling objected oriented designed systems.
 The process of designing the system is driven and anchored by use of use cases which play a
significant role in modelling the expected behaviors of the system and the actors that will be
interacting with the system within a certain boundary. For developers, use cases help save time
in understanding the requirements of the system as compared to documents like the
requirements document which tend to be redundant, ambiguous or redundant at most times.
Thus use of use cases help both the development team and the client team to trace the
requirements of the system because use cases are easy to analyze after the two teams have
agreed on the requirements of the system based on the use case diagrams. For the
implementation phase of the project use cases help decompose requirements into smaller
requirements which can be allocated to various development team members (Scott, 2001).
 The unified process is architecture-centric. Architecture can basically be defined as the
fundamental organization of the proposed system as a whole. For Comfort Quits Limited, this

includes all the sub systems making up the integral system through which different business
activities are carried out for example; the stock control subsystem, customer relationship
subsystem and the accounting subsystem. The unified process will describe the Comfort Quits
Limited information system by describing the static and dynamic elements making up each
subsystem, how the two types of elements work together and how the different subsystems are
integrated to form one integral information system.
 The design process in Unified process is incremental and iterative where by the design of the
system is done through a sequence of processes. An iteration is a mini project that is released
externally for example to Comfort Quits limited or internally to the development team. The end
of every iteration results to a new version of the system.
The life cycle of the proposed system can be viewed as a series of cycles where by at the end of every
cycle a version of the system will be released to Comfort Quits Limited. Each cycle can be divided into
four phases where by a phase is the span of time between two major milestones and points at which
important decisions affecting the schedule, budget and scope are evaluated and taken. The four phases
are;
 Inception phase
The inception phase is the phase of the cycle where the viability of the Comfort Quits Limited
will be evaluated. The evaluation is done by defining the scope of the proposed system,
specifying the architecture which is best suited for the system for example it could be N-tier or
client-server architecture, identifying all the critical risks that might be incurred and formulating
contingency plans and measures to address the risks and finally establishing the direction of the
project based on the cost estimates, effort estimates and schedule estimates.
The major milestone achieved in the inception phase are referred to as life-cycle objectives. The
key indications of the project reaching these milestones include an agreement between
Comfort Quits limited and the development team.
 Elaboration phase
The main objective of the elaboration phase is to establish the possibility that the proposed
Comfort Quits Limited will be built despite of the schedule constraints, financial constraints and
other types of constraints that might be faced by the project. The major milestone in
elaboration phase is called life-cycle architecture and it’s achieved if most if not all of the
functional requirements are captured within the use case model.
 Construction phase
The primary objective of the phase is the actual implementation which involves building the
system capable of successfully operating in the Comfort Quits Limited. The major milestone of
this phase is called initial operational capability and is achieved if the client has an operational
version of the system.
 Transition phase
The primary objective of the transition phase is the deployment of the fully working system to
the client. The major objective is called product release.
The unified process is the most suitable adaptive methodology for use to develop the Comfort Quits
Limited as it will provide a better way of documenting the system thus making it easy to maintain in the
future.

References
Alhir, S.S., 2001. Understanding the Unified Process (UP). Method and Tools. Available at:
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Freedman, R., 2010. Adaptive Project Framework: A new level of agile development. Tech Republic.
Available at: http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/tech-decision-maker/adaptive-project-framework-a-
new-level-of-agile-development/ [Accessed October 19, 2017].
Mrsic, M., 2016. Adaptive Project Management. Active Collab LLC. Available at:
https://activecollab.com/blog/project-management/adaptive-project-management [Accessed October
19, 2017].
Scott, K., 2001. Overview of the Unified Process. Inform IT. Available at:
http://www.informit.com/articles/article.aspx?p=24671&seqNum=10 [Accessed October 19, 2017].