Use Cases: Patterns and Blueprints

Chapter 13. Describing Use Cases

Documenting Use Cases

After the use cases have been identified, they must be described in detail. It must be stated what sequences of actions they represent, what external events will cause the various sequences to be performed, and so on. Without a more detailed description of the use cases, a use case will not be more than a named ellipse, which in most cases is not enough as a specification of the usage of the system. A Use-Case Description document should be prepared for each use case in the use-case model. How to describe the use-case model as a whole is discussed in the next chapter (Chapter 14, “Documenting a Use-Case Model”).

The use cases themselves can be documented in many different ways. The most common ...