Editor. M. Zelm, Gehenbuehlstr. 18A, D-70499 Stuttgart
The CIMOSA - News is published by the CIMOSA Association. The CIMOSA News will report on CIMOSA applications, evolution of its technical specification, advancements in standardisation and related items. Contributions from other parties are welcome. The CIMOSA - News will be printed periodically and will be distributed to all parties interested in CIMOSA. The CIMOSA - News is also available in WWW under the address http://cimosa.cnt.pl/News/
FIAT is presently involved in two projects to further exploit the CIMOSA methodology:
DARIF - a project on Tools and Methods for Decentralised Workgroup and Information Structures based on Business Processes - has been granted to a consortium lead by the Engineering School Offenburg within the R&D Programme 'Production 2000' of the German Ministry for Research and Education (BMBF). The consortium consists of four Small and Medium sized Enterprises (SME) from different user branches - paper/printing, electrical appliances and office equipment - one software company, GPP contributing with the PACE Tool, the Engineering School Offenburg and the Technical Universities Karlsruhe and Magdeburg,. The CIMOSA Association is participating as an expert consultants group. The objective of DARIF is to develop and implement reference models, methods and tools for computer supported co-operative work (CSCW) in SME's and information structures based on business processes. Operational start is in 1Q/96.
A comparison of the enterprise integration methodologies ARIS, CIMOSA, GRAI, IEM and PERA has been made with the goal to demonstrate the benefits of a common process oriented representation of enterprise modelling. The comparison - made in terms of the internal process structure and information used and produced - enables to assess coverage of the enterprise life cycle and shows the emphasis on the different enterprise life cycle phases. In addition, the modelling languages (constructs) of the methodologies have been compared. The findings have been presented at the EI95 conference in Heron Island.
A market survey of modelling tools and model enacting systems has been completed : 170 tools have been identified and analysed and 120 vendors have been contacted. Tools are broken down into the categories graphical process documentation, simulation of production logistics, process enactment (limited workflow control) and business process management (advanced workflow management). The final report of this survey will be available at the end of 1Q/96.
Enhancements in the description of process behaviour to include ill-structured processes will be discussed in a PES internal workshop on January 24, 1996 in Stuttgart. Ill-structured processes are those for which the exact sequence of all employed sub-processes is not completely known. To describe ill-structured processes, two types of behavioural rules, random choice rules and open set rules need to be added to the previous rule set.
Discussions are ongoing to introduce the Economic View as a separate modelling view of the CIMOSA Modelling Framework with a documentation in the Technical Baseline. The Economic View aims to collect and structure relevant information through the use of Economic Objects.
In addition, the constructs of the resource and organisation view and the modelling process will be reviewed and discussed at the above mentioned internal workshop.
Various CIMOSA contributions were made to the document N90: "Constructs for Enterprise Modelling" supporting CEN/TC310/WG1 through participation at the meetings in London, Senlis and Brussels. As a result of the voting meeting in Berlin on December 17, 1995 the document will become a European Pre-Norm (ENV 12204, "Constructs for Enterprise Modelling").
Participation in the German DIN Programme "EBN 2000" - for Development Accompanying Standardisation - has resulted in two CIMOSA related proposals for standardisation projects.
The IFAC/IFIP Task Force on Enterprise Integration has been supported through contributions and participation in a meeting at Heron Island.
CIMOSA will be presented at a workshop of the GiPP Project sponsored by the German Ministry of Research and Education in the R&D Programme 'Production 2000' . Other methods presented at the workshop will be QCIM, DZ-SIMPROLOG and QS-VP6 .
Contacts have been established with the CALS Industrial Steering Group to participate in a co-operation with DOC-NIST on 'Enterprise Integration-International Consensus' proposed as EP21859 EI-IC. The proposal has been recommended for further consideration in the ESPRIT Programme evaluation.
The Department of Production Engineering of Chalmers University of Technology at Gothenburg, Sweden will include CIMOSA in an MSc course on 'Integrated Manufacturing Systems' in their 95/96 Programme on Automation Engineering.
Two Papers on the CIMOSA status and the CIMOSA Business Modelling Process have been published in Computers in Industry 27 (1995).
For the IFAC World Congress 96, in San Francisco, June 30- July 5, 1996, two papers on CIMOSA and its relation to GERAM (Generalised Enterprise Reference Architecture and Methodology) have been accepted for presentation.
Dr. Hubert Zimmermann has been awarded the annual Peter-Wehrhahn-Price for the best thesis in Business Management at the University St.Gallen with his work on 'Potentials of Integrated Organisation Modelling in Manufacturing Enterprises' . Dr. Zimmermann has contributed to the development of the Organisation View modelling constructs in EP 7110 (AMICE). In his thesis, which is based on the CIMOSA modelling framework, potentials in terms of strategic management are developed. The fully integrated organisation view is key to this area of enterprise modelling.
As deliverables of the ESPRIT Project 9814 : 'CIMOSA Promotion and Evolution Support' the following new promotion material is available:
For more details please request the list of CIMOSA offerings from the CIMOSA Association.
The CIMOSA Association is involved in promotion of CIMOSA, its active support in national, European and international standardisation and in consolidation of the evolution of its technical specification - the CIMOSA Technical Baseline. The CIMOSA Association acts as a focal point for all parties involved in applying CIMOSA in industrial and research environments.
Members of the CIMOSA Association are industrial and research organisations involved in exploitation of CIMOSA or interested in the subject of enterprise integration (EI). Membership is open to any organisation interested to support EI and CIMOSA.
www-cimosa@cnt.pl, 10.02.1996 (last update: 10.02.1996)