ACADEMIA Letters
Designing and Developing OPCloud, an OPM-based
Collaborative Software Environment, in a Mixed
Academic and Industrial Setting: An Experience Report
Hanan Kohen
Dov Dori
Abstract
OPCloud is a Web-based collaborative software environment for model-based sys-
tems engineering (MBSE) used for creating conceptual models in Object-Process Method-
ology, OPM, ISO 19450:2005. As we have been designing and developing OPCloud, we
faced several challenges, mostly stemming from the unique development environment.
OPCloud is a high-end, Cloud-based tool. Software of this kind is developed by com-
mercial companies, be they large established ones or small startups. In contrast, OP-
Cloud is developed in an academic environment at a technological university. As such,
it involves a variety of people contributing to its development, each having a diferent
objective, capabilities, and commitment level. In this report, we describe our experiences
of a three-year project of OPCloud software design and development. To this end, we
have adopted an agile development methodology, involving regular weekly meetings of
all the development stakeholders and monthly product deployment to be delivered to the
commercial company customer. We describe how we engaged the diverse population of
developers, including faculty, post-doctoral fellows, academic researchers, graduate and
undergraduate students, and dedicated developers, in the software development process.
Index Terms— Object-Process Methodology, OPM; model-based systems engineering (MBSE);
OPCloud
Academia Letters, July 2021
Corresponding Author: Hanan Kohen, hanank@campus.technion.ac.il
Citation: Kohen, H., Dori, D. (2021). Designing and Developing OPCloud, an OPM-based Collaborative
Software Environment, in a Mixed Academic and Industrial Setting: An Experience Report. Academia Letters,
Article 1918. https://doi.org/10.20935/AL1918.
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©2021 by the authors — Open Access — Distributed under CC BY 4.0