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CaseMaster® is, under the hood, an Application Development Framework based on the innovative concept of 'self describing objects'.
It is this unique foundation that reduces development time from days to hours (or even minutes) and which makes CaseMaster® solutions so extremely adaptable.

Self Describing Objects
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The ideas behind the self-describing-object theory are simple and best explained using an example: imagine an airline reservation system, an insurance claim handling system and a bank savings account management system:



The airline reservation system

  • The user enters the date, origin- and destination airport
  • The system lists the available flights for that date
  • The user selects one of the flights
  • The system now lists the available seats
  • The user selects a seat and enters the passenger details to make a booking




The insurance claim handling system

  • The user enters the policy number
  • The system lists the policy details and a history of claims
  • The user selects one of the claims
  • The system shows the details of that claim
  • The use can now enter the date and amount of pay-out on that claim




The bank saving account management system

  • The user enters the account reference number
  • The system lists the account details and a history of deposits and withdrawals on the account
  • The user selects one of the transactions
  • The system now shows the details of that transaction
  • The user can now edit the details of that transaction




It is very easy to see the similarities between these functions: search, list, show / edit details.

The theory of self-describing-objects is based on the notion that most functions of administrative systems can be brought back to a limited number of basic functions. Typical examples of such basic functions are:

  • Search for specific data
  • List result of a search
  • Show details of a specific data record
  • Allow details of a specific data record to be edited
  • Etc

You can probably come up with 10 or 15 basic building blocks or so. A bit like Lego® really.

The real difference between the airline-, insurance- and the bank system is not in the basic building blocks; the real difference is in the underlying data. Flights and reservations for the airline system; policies and claims for the insurance system and accounts and transactions for the banking system.

Appreciating this makes the next concept of CaseMaster® easy to understand...
Self Describing Objects        What & what-with         The Theory at work         Implementation