Use case
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Use case

In both software and systems engineering, a use case is a structured description of a system’s behavior as it responds to requests from external actors, aiming to achieve a specific goal. The term is also used outside software/systems engineering to describe how something can be used.

In software (and software-based systems) engineering, it is used to define and validate functional requirements. A use case is a list of actions or event steps typically defining the interactions between a role (known in the Unified Modeling Language (UML) as an actor) and a system to achieve a goal. The actor can be a human or another external system. In systems engineering, use cases are used at a higher level than within software engineering, often representing missions or stakeholder goals. The detailed requirements may then be captured in the Systems Modeling Language (SysML) or as contractual statements.

In software engineering, the use case defines potential scenarios of the software in response to an external request (such as user input). In systems engineering, a use case models high-level functional behavior across technical and human components.[citation needed]

In software and systems engineering, the phrase use case is a polyseme with two senses:

This article discusses the latter sense. (For more on the other sense, see Persona (user experience).)

In 1987, Ivar Jacobson presented the first article on use cases at the OOPSLA'87 conference. He described how this technique was used at Ericsson to capture and specify requirements of a system using textual, structural, and visual modeling techniques to drive object-oriented analysis and design. Originally he had used the terms usage scenarios and usage case – the latter a direct translation of his Swedish term användningsfall – but found that neither of these terms sounded natural in English, and eventually he settled on use case.

In 1992 he co-authored the book Object-Oriented Software Engineering - A Use Case Driven Approach, which laid the foundation of the OOSE system engineering method and helped to popularize use cases for capturing functional requirements, especially in software development. In 1994 he published a book about use cases and object-oriented techniques applied to business models and business process reengineering.

At the same time, Grady Booch and James Rumbaugh worked at unifying their object-oriented analysis and design methods, the Booch method and Object Modeling Technique (OMT) respectively. In 1995 Ivar Jacobson joined them and together they created the Unified Modelling Language (UML), which includes use case modeling. UML was standardized by the Object Management Group (OMG) in 1997. Jacobson, Booch and Rumbaugh also worked on a refinement of the Objectory software development process. The resulting Unified Process was published in 1999 and promoted a use case driven approach.

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