The authors introduce an analysis and design method customized to form-based enterprise applications, the predominant type of business application. The text provides a comprehensive introduction to form-based systems, explaining their common properties and giving at the same time a hands-on introduction to the modeling of such systems. Form-based enterprise applications are modeled by a bipartite state machine and a tiered data model as a class diagram. The modeling method is explained with the TCW-3 online bookshop as a running example, in which the user can experience the modeling concepts in action.

Form-based applications range from simple web shops to complex enterprise resource planning systems. Draheim and Weber adapt well-established basic modeling techniques in a novel way to achieve a modeling framework optimized for this broad application domain. They introduce new modeling artifacts, such as page diagrams and form storyboards, and separate dialogue patterns to allow for reuse. In their implementation they have developed new constructs such as typed server pages, and tools for forward and reverse engineering of presentation layers. The methodology is explained using an online bookshop as a running example in which the user can experience the modeling concepts in action. The combination of theoretical achievements and hands-on practical advice and tools makes this book a reference work for both researchers in the areas of software architectures and submit-response style user interfaces, and professionals designing and developing such applications. More information and additional material is also available online.