UML Domain Models and Requirements

In typical commercial data base centric systems, the domain model can be a valuable start point for requirements analysis, as long as the business analyst is experienced in their use. Unfortunately the creation of any form of data model is too often thought of as a job for technicians, probably data base designers. I feel that this can lead straight to the consideration of database efficencies before we have really understood the business view of the data and the business rules. Iwas therefore pleased to see this article, although not written by a business analyst, on the OMG web site – Articulate Class Models.

I believe the quality of analysis could be considerably improved if more BAs improved their class / entity modelling skills to the point where creation of a domain model became as natural as creating use cases.