Create An IT Landscape Diagram
Tutorial IT Landscape
You will create this IT landscape by using one web application on the Dragon1 platform: The Visual Designer.
This visualization shows an IT landscape. An overview like this is necessary for any organization.
You will take the following steps:
- Create a dossier structure
- Enter Data
- Create process and application models, using the data
- Create links between the process and application models
- Create process and application views, using the models
- Create links between views
- Create a visualization, using the views
- Publish the visualization to the Viewer to have it commented by stakeholders
Step 1. - Create a Dossier Structure
First we are going to create a dossier structure in a cabinet to store our data.
To create a dossier structure
- Go to the Visual Designer
- Create or open a Cabinet
- Select the cabinet in the Explorer treeview
- Create a dossier
- Create four folders in the dossier: Data, Model, View and Visualization
Step 2. - Enter Data
On Dragon1 you can enter data by dragging shapes to a folder.
To enter data
- Go to the Visual Designer
- Create or open a Cabinet
- Select a folder
- Insert shapes from the Draw Archifact or Draw Entity dropdown menu
- For the process-application landscape choose the shapes for three layers:
- Business Layer: Group, Function, Process, Activity
- Information Layer: Information Object
- Application Layer: Application, Database, Interface, Service
- Select a shape in the treeview
- Select the shapes' icon on the canvas
- Change the name of the shape at the right top in the text attributes of the Inspector
Step 3. - Create a Model, using the data
To create a model
- Go to the Visual Designer
- Create or open a Cabinet
- Select a folder
- Insert models from the menu bar
- Create models for the process-application landscape for every entity class you have used
- Process model, Service model, Application model, etc...
- Enter a name for the model
- Optionally choose a type for the model
- Insert shapes like processes and applications for the model by clicking on Draw Archifact or Draw entity and drag the shape onto the canvas
- You can change the color and size of the shapes
- Draw connections between the shapes using the smart tools of a selected shape.
Step 4. - Create links between models
To create a link between models:
- Select a model in the Explorer treeview
- Select a shape in the model
- Enter a link to another model in the LinkURL field of the text attributes
Step 5. - Create a View, using the model
To create a view
- Go to the Visual Designer
- Create or open a Cabinet
- Select a folder
- Insert views from the menubar
- Create views for the process-application landscape for each model you created:
- Functions view, Process view and Activities view, etc..
- Enter a name
- Select the model to use
- Enter a viewing rule for the model data:
- Rule Event: onload
- Rule Condition: Class=Process;Name=Sales;Relation=FirstLevel
- Rule Action: Show(name)
Step 6. - Create links between views
To create a link between views:
- Select a view in the Explorer treeview
- Select a shape in the view
- Enter a link to another view in the LinkURL field of the text attributes
Step 7. - Create a Visualization, using the views
To create a visualization
- Go to the Visual Designer
- Create or open a Cabinet
- Select a folder
- Insert a visualization from the menubar
- Drag a shape on the canvas. You will use this shape to generate the view data on the canvas.
- For the process-application landscape use three shapes:
- One for Functions, Processes and Activities.
- Save the visualization
- Select one of the three view shapes
- Enter the following view rules in the data attributes panel of the inspector.
- Rule Event: onload
- Rule Condition: Class=Process
- Rule Action: Show(name)
Do this for all three view shapes
With this rule you will only see the processes from the view data. You can also show the whole view with Rule Condition = *.
Step 8. - Publish the visualization
To publish a visualization:
- Select a visualization in a folder
- Click on the Share button in the menubar
- Enter the correct data in the dialog
- Click on the share button in the dialog
- Now go to the Viewer and search for your visualization by its title
- Add a comment to the visualization
- Filter the visualization on certain values
It is also interesting to read the page of IT Architecture in the resources section.