Generating information exchange requirements and needlines (ABM for DoDAF)

Architecting and designing > DoDAF > DoDAF 1.5 Activity Based Methodology (ABM) > Developing operational views with DoDAF ABM > Generating information exchange requirements and needlines (ABM for DoDAF)

You can use a utility to automatically generate Information Exchange Requirement (IER) definitions and Needline definitions.

1 Click Tools > DoDAF (ABM) Utilities > Generate Information Exchange Definitions.

2 Select Generate IERs from leaf level Activities.

If you feel it is not possible to decompose your OV-5 Activity diagrams down to a lowest-leaf level, you can choose the other selection, Generate IERs from leaf and parent level Activities.

3 You can also select the following options:

•Associate IERs to new and/or existing Needlines

•Associate IERs to generated Needlines

•Associate IERs to user-drawn Needlines

•Remove generated Needlines that contain no related IERs

•Remove user drawn Needlines which contain no related IERs

•Disassociate any invalid IERs from Needlines

4 Click Run.

The appropriate Information Exchange Requirement (IER) definitions and Needline definitions are generated, and a report is displayed that details the actions taken and problems encountered.

This graphic is described in the surrounding text.

Analyze the report. The IER Generator parses OV-05 Activity models, collects all leaf level activities, reviews all their inputs, traces and attempts to locate an output for each input based on the activity's relationship to operational nodes.