Tool Mentors > Rational Suite AnalystStudio Tool Mentors > Managing Use Cases Using Rational Rose and Rational RequisitePro

Purpose

This tool mentor describes how to manage use cases in Rational Rose using integrated use-case attributes and documents in Rational RequisitePro.

Related Rational Unified Process™ information:

Overview

Implementers, testing professionals, and project managers manage use cases as they are developed and refined throughout the inception, elaboration, construction, and transition phases of a project. Effective use-case management requires integrated documentation to record the current status of the use case and to provide detailed descriptions of the use case.

Rational’s Integrated Use-Case Management allows you to manage use cases using attributes—such as Priority, Risk, Status, and Iteration—by associating use cases in Rose with RequisitePro documents and requirements. You can easily navigate from use-case models in Rose to RequisitePro use-case documents and requirements. Use-case management in RequisitePro adds depth and relational information to your Rose use cases with support for:

  • textual definitions of use cases in a Microsoft Word documents
  • detailed descriptions of flows of events, special requirements, preconditions and postconditions
  • hierarchical (parent-child) relationships between use-case names and actions within the use-case flow of events
  • traceability to and from other use cases and associated design features, and test plans

Although many developers may prefer to initially develop use cases in Rose, most analysts will prefer to first develop use-case requirements in RequisitePro. Integrated Use-Case Management allows you to begin in either tool and then create associated use cases or use-case requirements in the other tool. Both approaches offer integrated use-case management with several easy menu selections.

Tool Steps

This document contains the following steps:

  1. Associate Rational Rose and Rational RequisitePro artifacts
  1. Manage use-case attributes and documents
  2. Create Rational Rose use cases from Rational RequisitePro requirements

1. Associate Rational Rose and Rational RequisitePro Artifacts To top of page

To benefit from Integrated Use-Case Management, you must first associate your Rose model or package with a RequisitePro project. This model or package association establishes available document types and requirements types for your use-case description and management.

Use cases can then be associated with existing or new RequisitePro use-case documents. Each use case can also be associated directly to a RequisitePro requirement; you associate the use case with the requirement text (not the requirement name) property. This requirement association provides the specific attributes to manage the use-case development.

Associating a model or package with a RequisitePro project

  1. Open the Rational Rose model.
  2. Do one of the following:
  • To associate a model with a project, click Tools > RequisitePro > Associate Model to Project. The Associate Model to Project dialog box appears.
  • To associate a package with a project, right-click the package and click RequisitePro > Associate Package to Project. The Associate Package to Project dialog box appears.
  1. At the Project File field, click the Browse button. Navigate to and select the RequisitePro project file (with an .RQS extension). Typically, this is located in a project subdirectory in the \Program Files\Rational\RequisitePro\Projects directory. This may vary when accessing network-based projects or customized local project directories.
  2. Click Open. The full path and name of the RequisitePro.RQS file appears in the Project File field. The available document types and requirement types are listed in their respective fields.
  3. At the Default Document Type field, click the down arrow and select a document type from the list.
    This document type, such as "Use-Case Specification", determines the template for your Word document and a default requirement type for all requirements in that document.
  4. At the Default Requirement Type field, click the down arrow and select a requirement type from the list. This requirement type, such as UC, controls the choice of attributes, such as Priority, Status, and Iteration, that you will use when managing your use cases.
  5. If you are using a virtual path map for your Rose model, select a Rose Path Map.
  6. Click OK to save the association and close the dialog box.

Refer to the topic titled Associating a model with a project in the Integrated Use-Case Management online Help.

Associating use cases with RequisitePro requirements

Associate a Rose use case with a RequisitePro requirement to take full advantage of use-case management using requirement attributes. Note that the requirement text, not the requirement name, may be used to create this association.

Associating a use case with an existing requirement
  1. In the Rose model browser tree or use-case diagram, right-click a use case.
  2. Select Requirement Properties > Associate from the context menu. The Associate a Requirement to Use Case dialog box appears.
  3. At the Requirements of type field, select a requirement type, such as UC, for managing the use-case attributes.
  4. Select a requirement from the displayed list and click OK.
    • If the requirement has a name but no text, the Resolve Use Case Name dialog box appears, allowing you to assign the requirement text, the use-case name, or your own entry to both the requirement text and use-case name.
    • If the existing requirement contains text, the text is updated to the name of the Rose use case.
    A requirement dialog box appears, with the Attributes tab displayed.
  5. Make changes to the requirement properties.
Associating a use case with a new requirement
  1. In the Rose model browser tree or use-case diagram, right-click a use case.
  2. Select Requirement Properties > New from the context menu. A new requirement is created in the RequisitePro project. The text of the requirement contains the name of the Rose use case. A requirement dialog box appears, with the Attributes tab displayed.
  3. Make changes to the requirement properties.

Refer to the following topics in the Integrated Use-Case Management online Help:

  • Associating a use case with a new requirement
  • Associating a use case with an existing requirement

Associating use cases with RequisitePro documents

Associating a use case with an existing document
  1. In the Rose model browser tree or use-case diagram, right-click a use case.
  2. Select Use Case Document > Associate from the context menu. The Associate Document to Use Case dialog box appears.
  3. At the Documents of type field, select a document type for the list below.
  4. Select a document from the displayed list and click OK.
Associating a use case with a new document
  1. In the Rose model browser tree or use-case diagram, right-click a use case.
  2. To create a new document, select Use Case Document > New from the context menu. RequisitePro opens a new document of the document type specified in the Rose model or package association with the RequisitePro project. The new document name and file name matches the name of the Rose use case.
  3. Use the RequisitePro > Document > Save command in RequisitePro's Word Workplace to save the document.

Refer to Associating a use case with an existing document in the Integrated Use-Case Management online Help.

2. Manage use-case attributes and documents To top of page

Use-case attributes are managed in an associated RequisitePro requirement. By default, the Attributes tab is displayed when the Requirement dialog box is opened. You can use the General and Revision tabs to review requirement information. In addition, you can use the Traceability tab to add traceability to and from other requirements in RequisitePro. For more information on traceability, refer to the RequisitePro online help.

To set the values of the use-case attributes, do the following:

  1. Right-click on a Rose use case that is associated with a requirement or a document.
  2. Select Requirements Attributes > Open from the context menu. The requirement dialog box appears.
  3. At the attribute fields on the Attributes tab select or type a value for each attribute field.
    Note: Do not modify the RoseType, RoseModelPath, or RoseItemID attributes.
  4. Click OK to save your settings and close the dialog box.

To open the RequisitePro requirements document that is associated with a use case:

  1. In the browser tree or use-case diagram, right-click a use case that has an association with a RequisitePro document.
  2. Select Use Case Document > Open from the context menu.

Refer to these topics in the Integrated Use-Case Management online Help:

  • Assigning attribute values to a use case
  • Opening the associated document

3. Create Rational Rose use cases from Rational RequisitePro requirements To top of page

To use Rational RequisitePro use-case requirements to create use cases in a Rational Rose model:

  1. Select a requirement in a RequisitePro view or document. For document-based requirements, open the document and simply place the cursor in the requirement text.
  2. Select Requirement > Rational Rose >Associate to Use Case. In the Word Workplace, these menu selections are found on the RequisitePro menu. The Document Rose Use-Case Association dialog box appears.
  3. Type a full path and Rose model file name in the indicated field, or click Browse and open the Rose model file.
  4. Click Apply. Any use cases in the model that are not associated to a requirement or document appear in the Select Rose Item(s) list.
  5. Select a use case and click Create. The Create a New Use Case dialog box appears. The Use-Case Name field displays the selected requirement text, by default. To change the name of the new use case, type a new entry.
  6. Select a package in which the new use case will be located.
  7. Click OK. If the Use-Case Name entry is different than the requirement text, the Resolve Use Case Name dialog box appears.
  8. Do one of the following:
  • Select Requirement Text to apply the RequisitePro requirement text to the Rose use-case name.
  • Select Use Case Name to apply the Rose use-case name to the RequisitePro requirement text.
  • Select Other and type a new entry that will be applied to both the RequisitePro requirement text and the Rose use-case name.
  1. Click OK.

Refer to Creating use cases from requirements in the Integrated Use-Case Management online Help.

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