Bx Examples Repository
Title: The Vanishing Allergy
Version: 0.1
Type: Sketch
For example, Precise, Industrial, Sketch. Use common sense concerning whether to use one or more: for example, Precise and Sketch should be mutually exclusive, but conceivably either might be combined with Industrial.
Overview
(This is a placeholder for an example from Dagstuhl.) This example relates to provenance. Suppose we have two healthcare systems, one used by a general practitioner and one by a specialist. The general practitioner's system records patients' allergies and ongoing drug prescriptions. The specialist's records some more detailed information, and the drug prescriptions made by this specialist - but not allergies. The consistency that is maintained is that drugs in the specialist system should also be in the GP's, and that no patient should be prescribed a drug to which they are allergic. Patient X is recorded by the GP as being allergic to Drug Y. Patient X sees a specialist, who would normally have prescribed Drug Y, but because of the allergy, uses skill to prescribe (more expensive or less effective) Drug Z instead. Later, the GP determines that Patient X is not, in fact, allergic to Drug Y. Ideally, the provenance of the decision to prescribe Drug Z would enable the GP to change the prescription to Drug Y - but usually, it wouldn't.
A thumbnail description of the example, not more than two or three sentences; might include a brief summary of the example and/or a brief reason for its inclusion in the repository (“demonstrates [some interesting point]” for example).
Models
Descriptions of the models, possibly with (formal) expressions of their meta-models. (We use the term “model”, and “meta-model” inclusively: any appropriately precise description of the information sources being transformed is acceptable.)
Consistency
Description of the consistency relationship between models. This should at least be in natural language, but may be augmented by formal expression in some language cognate with that of the meta-models.
Consistency Restoration
Explain in which of the typically many possible ways inconsistencies are to be repaired. May be divided into separate descriptions of forward and backward restoration.
Properties [optional section]
What additional properties are expected to hold of, or be exemplified by, the transformation? These will link to a separate glossary of definitions of terms such as ‘hippocraticness’.
Variants [optional section]
A difficult issue that we have found arises in writing examples is how to handle the choice points. Typically in making an example, even a small one, precise, one realises that there are several points where more than one choice is reasonable. These multiply to give a potentially unmanageable set of examples. Our proposal is that one “base” example should be given in the main body of the text, and variation points described here.
Discussion
Origin, utility, interest, representativeness, related examples in the literature, …
References [optional section]
Bibliographic data for the paper or papers from which the example is taken, or where it is discussed, if applicable.
Author(s)
Perdita Stevens typing about an example by Jens Weber
Contributing author(s) of the example to the repository.
Reviewer(s)
We intend that examples remain provisional (version 0.x) until reviewed (and approved, if necessary after modification) by other members of the wiki. In the interest of traceability and credit, such reviewers are identified here.
Comments
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Artefacts [optional section]
Formal descriptions, perhaps downloadable code, example inputs and outputs, virtual machine instances, diagrams…
