Structured analysis and design of manufacturing information systems

Two case studies show the importance of the use of a formal approach to the specification of requirements for manufacturing information systems. They also show that such an approach can be time-consuming even when computer-based CASE tools are used. The application of currently available CASE methods and tools to the specification and design of manufacturing information systems is a valid one and provides the following benefits: facilitates communication between users and analysts, assists in ordering the complexity of the project, provides the ability to cope with the large volumes of data needed to describe the system, and ensures the effective validation by users of the analyst´s view of the system. However, the length of the learning curve for some of the techniques, the time consumed by most of the methods and the weakness of fit to dynamic manufacturing systems which include material as well as information flows mitigate against their use by the current generation of manufacturing engineers without significant training support