Template-based development promising, but not a snap - developing software with industry-specific templates

Software Magazine, June, 1994 by Janet Butler

The old insurance agent application ran in an environment consisting of a 3090 mainframe running MVS and online Vsam. While the new sytem -- called Produce, Appoint and Compensation (PAC) -- is initially targeting the 3090, it may eventually move to an ES 9000 or client/server platform, he said. The new system uses MVS, online CICS and DB2. Users have moved from dumb terminals to 386 PCs.

PAC, a two-year project, is due to be completed this October. The finished system will contain 500 programs, said Johnson. In producing PAC, he continued, "we developed architectural templates to maximize reusable components and transfer skill level." The nine templates provide modules for such functions as error routines, security and access control, and naming conventions.

The new system has improved developers productivity, Johnson continued. One developer -- who first had to learn ADW and DB2 -- was able to code 40 online DB2 programs in three months. Two experienced people were able to code 10 such programs each in three days. By contrast, said Johnson, a single modification in the old system might have required changes in 10 different programs, taking as long as three months.

While Johnson sees Jasco's templates as "very extensible" across the company, he is less enthusiastic about the viability of full health industry templates, claiming that companies might avoid them for the same reasons that they would forego packaged solutions. "The industry is changing so dramatically with health-care reform," he said, that the traditional underwriting and claims adjudication processes may be completely overhauled. He said massive customization of systems would be required, which would defeat the purpose of templates.

Still, that reasoning did not deter Jasco from selling its managed care system to Blue Cross/Blue Shield of Minneapolis, which will customize the software to meet its own needs.

What Blue Cross/Blue Shield receives, said Johnson, is an encyclopedia with templates and a common system architecture. The insurance provider also gets documentation, support time, and instruction on how to set up the PC development environment.

Blue Cross is purchasing the template because it would be far more costly to develop the system from scratch, said Johnson. And, though Blue Cross is committed to KnowledgeWare, buying from a user company like Jasco allows it to see the system from the developer's point of view, rather than from the vendor's.

While the sale to Blue Cross/Blue Shield helped Jasco pay its template development costs, Johnson emphasized that "we're not in the software game." He said the sale was "a fluke rather than a strategy."

No Flukes Here

But, what Johnson describes as a fluke is a bona fide market opportunity for many vendors. These vendors range from Case companies, to template-based firms like Dallas-based MetaSolv Software, to consultants like Andersen Consulting and Oracle Industries, Redwood Shores, Calif., a unit of Oracle Corp.

"Whether a Case provider gets into the game is a huge issue," said John Rockart, director of MIT's Center for Information Systems Research. Is the provider's strategy to provide templates, dabble in the field or concentrate on Case tools? Not all Case firms have decisively answered that question. he said.