Work Product: Actor
This artifact defines a coherent set of roles that users of the system can play when interacting with it. An instance of this artifact can be played by either an individual or an external system.
Purpose

Different stakeholders use this work product for different purposes:

  • System analysts - to define the system boundaries.
  • User-interface designers - to capture characteristics on human actors.
  • Use-case authors - to describe use cases and their interaction with actors.
  • Object analysts - to realize use cases and their interaction with actors.
Relationships
Input ToMandatory:
  • None
Optional: External:
  • None
Description
Brief Outline

In creating this artifact, you should consider various aspects of the artifact including the following:

  • the different interest groups or stakeholders who may have requirements to contribute
  • the different requirement types (categories, dimensions) that need to be considered
Properties
Optional
PlannedYes
Tailoring
Representation OptionsUML Representation: Actor

The actor may have the following properties:

  • Name: The name of the actor.
  • Brief Description: A brief description of the actor's sphere of responsibility and what the actor needs the system for. 
  • Characteristics: For human actors: The physical environment of the actor, the number of users the actor represents, the actor's level of domain knowledge, the actor's level of computer experience, other applications the actor is using, and other general characteristics such as gender, age, cultural background, and so on. 
  • Relationships: The relationships, such as actor-generalizations, and communicates-associations in which the actor participates. 
  • Diagrams: Any diagrams local to the actor, such as use-case diagrams depicting the actor's communicates-associations with use cases. 

Decide which properties to use and how to use them. In particular, you need to decide at which level of detail the "Characteristics" property needs to be described.



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