Session 1
Experiences with EA in the Cloud
Nizam Mohammed – Prolaborate, 6th Force and Sparx Systems India
Sparx EA as a cloud-based solution has been available for a few years, and it addresses many of the issues that on-premise, on-desktop EA implementations face. The Post-Pandemic Era has seen a swift move to a cloud-first strategy, and the Cloud Offerings for Sparx Products now allows businesses to achieve faster time to go-live, lower infrastructure costs, and eliminate setup and maintenance tasks. This session will cover how advancements in the Sparx Ecosystem and Cloud platforms have aided businesses in implementing the Sparx EA platform on the cloud.
Nizam Mohamed is a seasoned EA consultant with over 16 years of Sparx EA experience. Nizam is currently the Product Manager of Sparx Systems Prolaborate. He also leads the team that configures and manages cloud-based platforms for Sparx Systems’ global clients.
Modelling Complex Business Rules by Integrating Decision Tables and State Machines in EA
Phil Chudley – Dunstan Thomas
Business rules can be modelled as process flows, but EA does support Decision Tables in form of DMN (Decision Table Model Notation). Business Rules can be modelled and tested using multiple data sets. These DMN models can then be integrated to Systems / Software Dynamic Models in the form of Executable State Machines. Together these techniques provide a powerful modelling technique for Business and Software Design. This presentation presents on overview of the method to integrate DMN and ESM and will provide a demonstration of the integration in action using models built in EA.
I currently work as a Principal Consultant at Dunstan Thomas where I have been for past 16 years. I have used EA for 16 years, modelling in mostly UML, SysML, BPMN, ArchiMate. In addition to modelling I tend to specialise in developing custom MDGs, including Shapescripts, scripted solutions for automating tasks in EA, documentation generation including SQL and Script driven Template Fragments. I have also developed addins for EA.
Martin-Baker: Escaping with MBSE
Matt Hudson – Martin-Baker Aircraft Company Limited
In this session, Matt will explore Martin-Baker’s journey with MBSE and EA, what has driven them to adopt a model-based approach to Systems Engineering, what they have achieved so far and how it has enabled them to tackle increasingly complex challenges. He’ll also look at where they would like to be in the future and what some of the challenges they face are. Martin-Baker are the world’s leading supplier of aircrew ejection seats, with over 70 years of design, development and manufacturing history in aircraft escape systems.
Matt is a Systems Engineer for Martin-Baker where he uses EA to manage aircraft escape systems across their life cycle, working on escape systems pre-development, in qualification and in-service. Matt has worked with SysML and UML, along with EA’s automation capabilities, including the internal API for generating complex model outputs and document generation, alongside eaDocX. Matt enjoys developing tooling to integrate EA with other software, such as Martin-Baker’s internally developed ejection modelling software, and in his spare time enjoys software development and flight simulation.
Session 2
One Model – Many Projects
Ian & Jackie Mitchell – Ability Engineering (eaDocX, Model Expert and Portfolio Manager)
Managing multiple projects in the same EA repository has produced many solutions. In this session, Ian will review the available options, and present a new approach to managing models where there are many competing projects, in a ‘continuous change’ mode. Jackie will give a Project Managers perspective on what these solutions can deliver to the wider business, in terms of impact analysis and understanding project dependencies. And they will demonstrate a time machine…
Ian has been a Sparx user for 18 years, and a teacher and consultant in business analysis and architecture for much longer than that. His company – Ability Engineering – has been a Sparx partner for 12 years, and he writes the all-time most successful EA addin – eaDocX, the smart document generator for Word and Excel, Model Expert the model quality tool, and Portfolio Manager, the new version control extension for EA. Despite being a long-time passionate supporter of EA, he’s also not afraid to say where Sparx can improve, so be prepared for some honest and open discussions.
Jackie is the CEO of Ability Engineering, and has many years experience of project and programme management and training in the aerospace, telecoms and construction industries. The last 12 years have been spent supporting users and development of eaDocX, Model Expert and now, Portfolio Manager.
Using ThreatGet for Security-by-design
Peter Lieber – LieberLieber (Austria)
Peter will look at how we can use threatget.eu – a Cyber-Security-by-Design solution for the Automotive Industry. Industries with security-critical infrastructure are now required by the regulator to have an up-to-date cyber security management system, for example the new European Security Directive for the automotive industry (UNECE WP29 / ISO/SAE-21434)
I am an extrovert promoter and results-oriented controller and director. It like creating new partnerships and relations. I like people that are talking with me and it is important for me to help and motivate others. I’m very self-motivated and I prefer doing thinks I really like. I need a lot of creative and open space. But I also need people doing the administrative tasks and people realizing the ideas.
My highest motivation is doing creative work with and around Enterprise Architect. (www.sparxsystems.de)
SP Energy Networks – Our journey so far
Joyce Bianchi – SP Energy Networks
SP Energy Networks started their EA journey during a large SAP programme when they mapped their new Business Processes using BPMN and ArchiMate. This work proved critical to the success of identifying and communicating change within the organisation. Post programme SPEN maintained the new BAU model in a static state, created an applications catalogue, dabbled in data models and use case diagrams. During the last Covid WFH period SPEN relaunched their BPMN strategic goal and implemented Prolaborate. Joyce Bianchi will describe their journey over the last 6 years describing what worked well, not so well and using EA in lockdown.
Joyce has 30 years of experience in the electricity industry and is currently a Technical Process Leader in the Centre on Excellence within SP Energy Networks. She has spent the last 2 years working to develop SP Energy Networks Digitalisation and Data Strategy for the RIIO-ED2 regulatory cycle. Prior to this she worked on the implementation of a Network Asset Management System programme where her journey with EA started in the use of BPMN and AchiMate. She is a Prosci Change Management Practitioner and is currently working on an agile data squad to implement the provision of Open Data.
Session 3
Reuse isn’t just for software (LEGO bricks for architecture)
Matt Thomas – NHS Wales
How we in NHS Wales are resolving the competing requirements for free-thinking and creativity in our modelling work, with the needs for standardisation, reuse and model governance. I’ll show how that tension between creativity and formality has been approached using centralised catalogues of architecture building blocks to model multiple solutions in multiple workstreams without tripping over one another. I outline how a cloud EA repository surfaced through Prolaborate acts as the drawing board for wide stakeholder input and how a more tightly managed on-premise repository acts as our fully governed source of truth, and how we workflow between them.
Matt is a Lead Applications Design Architect for the NHS in Wales where he engineers solutions to improve health outcomes, e.g. the pandemic response. His current assignment is providing architecture oversight to the Genomics Programme in Wales. Alongside this, he leads an initiative to redefine the NHS Architecture Ways of Working, drawing upon 17 years of Enterprise Architect experience, that was preceded by a further 14 years of model based systems engineering with various tools and techniques.
EA for Assett Management
Jan de Liefde – The Collective (Netherlands)
Industrial- and Infrasystems are build for a long life-cycle. The developing time is short in relation to de whole system life-cycle, so Asset Management is the leading process for keeping systems on performance level and to initiate upgrade- en replacement projects. These projects have to perform in a tide schedule. Most of these projects have to realise these upgrades or replacement in a operational environment. Therefore actual documentation is mostly the critical factor.
Jan has more than 25 years of experience with the application of Systems and software engineering in various industrial domains of which the last 15 years in infrastructure. Specialisms: Systems engineering, requirement engineering, System modeling, functional analysis, Industrial automation, model based (systems) engineering.
EA at the UK Home Office
Mark Griffiths – Chaucer.com / UK Home Office
Mark has been working with Sparx EA on assignment with the Home Office. Mark will provide an insight into the use of Sparx EA at the Home Office and on the Transformation Programme that he is currently assigned to.
Mark has over 30 years of industry experience gained across multiple sectors. At Chaucer, Mark has predominantly worked at the Home Office for the last 8 years as a senior technical/solution architect on a portfolio of policing programmes. For the last 2 years Mark has been using Sparx EA to help define the Baseline, To-Be and Interim Transition State Architectures on a Home Office transformation programme. Mark is currently the chair of the Home Office Sparx Community forum.
Session 4
Declutter EA Workshop
Gillan Adens – Hippo Software (Sparx Services UK) (Scotland)
Learn tips and tricks to streamline the EA user interface and personalise the look & feel of EA. Setup custom workspace layouts, ribbons, perspectives, toolboxes, working sets and landing pages to focus on specific tasks and navigate your model with ease. Help novice EA users to be become productive rapidly with minimal training and mentoring.
Gillian is director at Hippo Software (services partner for Sparx Systems in the UK and Northern Europe). Gillian studied joint honours Mathematics and Computing Science at Glasgow University and is a Chartered IT Professional Member of the British Computer Society. Gillian was one of the first adopters of UML and Sparx EA in the UK (using EA from V2 onwards). She is also an expert in SysML, BPMN and ArchiMate. Gillian enjoys swimming and is a cub scout leader.
EA at Pay.uk
Aaron Abraham – Pay.uk
In Pay.UK, we’ve been on an exciting journey to explore our architectural underpinnings, and plug into Sparx in a big way. Using ArchiMate, we’ve sorted out a metamodel, set a baseline, and learned some fun lessons along the way in positioning Sparx to address some of our problems.
Aaron is an Enterprise Architect with experience in multiple domains and is a keen proponent of Agility in architecture (whatever that means). When not getting his hands dirty in architect-y stuff, Aaron enjoys playing the guitar, and has recently been trying to tame his back garden.
Version Control and Pro Cloud Server the best of both worlds
Daniel Siegl – LieberLieber (Austria)
Daniel will show how Git, Pro Cloud Server, Prolaborate and WebEA can work together for a super powerful Collaboration experience.
Daniel has been involved with model-based engineering since 2000. He first experienced model-based engineering with Together, and then moved on to the current focus: Enterprise Architect by Sparx Systems. He gained deep experience handling critical software projects around the world in the IT, apparel and footware industries. The next logical step was to join European-based LieberLieber, the Enterprise Architect Specialists, in 2006. In his role as developer of international business he also became CEO of LieberLieber Software Corp, based in Houston, TX, in 2014. Daniel is heavily involved with LieberLieber’s Automotive and Logistics clients, helping them to build tools to develop their products in a more efficient way. He is passionate about UML/SysML, embedded systems, and industry standards like AUTOSAR. He is an experienced speaker, a founding member of the Enterprise Architect User Group and represents LieberLieber at the Object Management Group, INCOSE and ProStep. Daniel lives with his family in Vienna, Austria.
Session 5
Data lineage with EA
Geert Bellekens – Bellekens IT (Belgium)
In this session Geert will explore how we can use EA to model data lineage:
- Where does my data come from, and where does it go
- Who has access to which data
- Categorizing data (GDPR => privacy data, etc…)
- Can answer questions such as “which data has possibly been compromised” in case there is a security incident.
Geert Bellekens started his freelance career in 2004 and has always had strong focus on UML, modelling and analysis methodology. He has helped several of the larger Belgian organizations to define and document their modelling method, train and coach the modelers and develop supporting tools. Geert Bellekens is an acknowledged Enterprise Architect expert and has written numerous add-ins for Enterprise Architect, including the free open source EA Navigator and the commercial EA-Matic. He is also one of the founding members and a regular speaker on the EA User Group events.
Using EA in a very large bank
Malcom Cawood – Kybernetica
The presentation is based on my experiences in a large investment Bank from 2015 to 2021. Sparx was used for their corporate Business Process Model, where one of the use cases was to demonstrate regulatory compliance with something called BCBC 239. The title is a provocation that reflects my initial rejection of the product, while the presentation as a whole describes why this changed and what was needed to make it happen.
After 12 years as a consultant at Casewise, who developed a Business Process and Enterprise Architecture Modelling toolset, Malcolm took a contract role with a major investment bank, where Sparx was the tool of choice for Business Process Modelling. More recently, he’s been exploring “systems’ thinking”, presenting at both the “Cybernetics Society” and “Systems & Complexity in Organizations”.
A simple approach for SW architecture modeling and safety analysis
Markus Lenzing – QSAS (Germany)
Using the AUTOSAR modelling approach (knowledge of which is not required to enjoy his talk) Markus has used to EA to model key elements of the SW architecture and perform safety analysis if his solution. The talk will cover
- SysML and Functional Safety
- The challenges they faced (more code than architecture)
- Software components and their realization
- Separating control and data flow
- Be careful with that “Safety Integrity” attribute
- Why they failed with State Machines
- Integration with Jama
I’ve studied Physics (MSc) at the University of Osnabrück. I’m working in the automotive and other industries for >10 years now on safety-critical hardware and software. Frequently I’m faced with the task of reverse engineering software. I’d like to share some key ideas on functional safety, MBSE and software architecture that I collected over the years.