Top-Level View Of Process
Manager
The "large-grain" prototyping tool, after undergoing a change
of format, design and ultimately name, has become the "Process Manager".
It has a deliberately simple user interface. Menus are minimal, and
where possible (and desirable), "look and feel" aspects from elsewhere
in the system have been adopted in order to allow the user to dive in as
quickly as possible.
The Main Menu Bar
Only one pull-down menu is exclusive to the Process Manager
- "Define", depicted in Figure 1.
This menu provides two sets of commands: Those
used to alter the pre- and/or post-conditions for that particular step
(the top four), and those used that allow the user to create/delete a "pass"
through the process, or signal that they wish to change the conditions
of the selected process step (the bottom three.)
Figure 1 
The Primary Process Manager Screen
Since a large part of "Process Management" is traversing
the Process (with the conditions of the Pass that is being worked on),
it was decided to make the Process Manager mirror the Virgil navigator
closely for ease of use. (See Figure 2.) Some changes to the
Virgil modus operandi were made to keep things clean, and will be detailed
below. Surrounding the "Process Map" (earlier referred to as "Virgil's
Evil Twin") is a "tabbed" format that allows the user to easily switch
between passes. In order to keep just one set of "tabs" on the screen,
changes were made to the process navigation interface.
After selecting the Process step to expand/collapse/change
conditions for by a single left-click, the following conventions
apply:
-
To Expand (always in place), peform a left double-click;
-
To Collapse, perform a right-click;
-
To Change Conditions, use the Define pull-down menu.
For more information, see Process Manager's Scenario 1.
Figure 2:
Change Conditions Screen
The Change Conditions screen (Figure
3) is based on the "Process Step Attribute Editing Dialog", its "partner"
in the Virgil universe. This is where the Deactivate, Relax, Reactivate,
and Strengthen commands operate.
Figure 3 