Structured process flows (SPFs): a process model for metrics

The author discusses an SPF process flow model that is suitable for communicating process descriptions to a wide audience and that can serve as a platform for metrics for both process and products. Large, complex, distributed command and control systems have been analyzed with a number of coordinated paradigms, including this model. Structured process flows give an integrated overview of systems complementary to the partitioned structure analysis models, as in structured analysis methods for real-time systems. They represent a leveled, end-to-end threaded view of the major processes in a system and provide the necessary first view of the system, while enabling the continuing decomposition for details. The SPFs are examined here as a platform for understanding processes, for exploration of metrics, and as a mechanism for collecting measurements.<>