Systems
197
interesting to determine if any advantages accrue to an index baseline of
“standards of reference” to gain better insight into the problems faced by
integration activities.
Functional Analysis
Fundamentally, functions serve as the means to constrain an object of which
it is a part through connection. Constrained objects, in turn, constrain processes. And, if processes are constrained by budgets, schedules, skills, scope,
policies, or rules, then objects and functions are constrained. Functional
analysis attempts to partition and provide more detail to delineate functions
so that they can be mapped into objects that can be built and integrated.
Systems engineering perform decomposition, analysis, and synthesis in a
highly iterative fashion to weed out overlapping and underlapping functions, provide unencumbered interfaces, and provide a workable structure of
events to facilitate clear and unambiguous integration.
The value of functions is to describe either the intended or incidental uses
of connected objects. Objects can be of two types—physical and intellectual.
Function can be explained in terms of performance of objects and by the
individual losses of the objects attributable to achieving those performances.
Functional analysis explains the capacities of an object (Cummins 1975)
through these performances and losses. Functional analysis views an object
by its possible uses given those performances and losses, in other words, by
their mechanism(s). Functional analysis is widely applicable and found in
use from the physical world of engineering to biology (e.g., cardiovascular
system, neurological system, endocrine system), architecture (e.g., placement
and access to services; views of nature and lighting of streets and buildings),
sociology (e.g., the set of rules governing safe travel by vehicles on the roads;
the criminal justice system of incarceration versus supervised rehabilitation
in half-way houses, the communication of an order to evacuate in the face of
a pending disaster by civic leaders), and economics (e.g., the introduction of
wireless smart-card technology to aid in commerce crossing international
borders, and identification of card holders via biometrics).
Functional analysis is often thought about and described as a hierarchical
decomposition of terms from top-level abstractions to lower-level details.
From the perspective of objects, no such reductionist portrayal is accurate or
representative of how functions are constructed or conceived by users
(objects). One can think of a network of objects or more appropriately, an
interconnected set of objects whose EMMI interoperate as per design or matter of expediency.
Cummins (1975) makes the case that functions are inherently related to
behaviors of objects. In that interpretation of relations between properties
197
interesting to determine if any advantages accrue to an index baseline of
“standards of reference” to gain better insight into the problems faced by
integration activities.
Functional Analysis
Fundamentally, functions serve as the means to constrain an object of which
it is a part through connection. Constrained objects, in turn, constrain processes. And, if processes are constrained by budgets, schedules, skills, scope,
policies, or rules, then objects and functions are constrained. Functional
analysis attempts to partition and provide more detail to delineate functions
so that they can be mapped into objects that can be built and integrated.
Systems engineering perform decomposition, analysis, and synthesis in a
highly iterative fashion to weed out overlapping and underlapping functions, provide unencumbered interfaces, and provide a workable structure of
events to facilitate clear and unambiguous integration.
The value of functions is to describe either the intended or incidental uses
of connected objects. Objects can be of two types—physical and intellectual.
Function can be explained in terms of performance of objects and by the
individual losses of the objects attributable to achieving those performances.
Functional analysis explains the capacities of an object (Cummins 1975)
through these performances and losses. Functional analysis views an object
by its possible uses given those performances and losses, in other words, by
their mechanism(s). Functional analysis is widely applicable and found in
use from the physical world of engineering to biology (e.g., cardiovascular
system, neurological system, endocrine system), architecture (e.g., placement
and access to services; views of nature and lighting of streets and buildings),
sociology (e.g., the set of rules governing safe travel by vehicles on the roads;
the criminal justice system of incarceration versus supervised rehabilitation
in half-way houses, the communication of an order to evacuate in the face of
a pending disaster by civic leaders), and economics (e.g., the introduction of
wireless smart-card technology to aid in commerce crossing international
borders, and identification of card holders via biometrics).
Functional analysis is often thought about and described as a hierarchical
decomposition of terms from top-level abstractions to lower-level details.
From the perspective of objects, no such reductionist portrayal is accurate or
representative of how functions are constructed or conceived by users
(objects). One can think of a network of objects or more appropriately, an
interconnected set of objects whose EMMI interoperate as per design or matter of expediency.
Cummins (1975) makes the case that functions are inherently related to
behaviors of objects. In that interpretation of relations between properties