It's surprising how easy it is for all of us to make assumptions...
For over twenty years, I've used the term "Fact Model" to describe what these days are known as Instance Models. That is, models that hold
explicit facts about stuff...
"Paolo uses EA"; "Sparx produces EA"; "The current version of EA is 7.5"
You can see that these facts represent
tuples.
Pottering about in the Business Rules Composer I came across references to a Fact Model. The EA Help has an example of this...
When I looked at it, I shook my head.... The Fact Model was described thus in the Help:
In Enterprise Architect a Fact Model is created as a conceptual Class diagram. How could a Classifier level diagram display Instances?
So I went onto the Net and checked a few definitions. EA is apparently using "Fact Model" in a common manner. I'd never gone looking, because I "knew" what a Fact Model was...
So, can someone show me where the "Facts" are in a Fact Model? That is, which Facts is the model modelling?
The best that my colleagues and I can come up with is that a "Fact Model" is
actually a "Fact
Rule Model".
TIA,
Paolo
[edit]Just to be perfectly clear... I have no beef with wither Sparx or EA for using this terminology. I'm just amused by the concept that: "a Fact Model doesn't model any facts..."
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