Mine COBOL logic for candidate rules

Candidate rules are rules written in unstructured natural language text to document business logic that is likely to be translated into executable business rules.

About this task

The process of mining COBOL logic for candidate rules is an iterative process consisting of the following steps. Instructions for each of these steps are included in the procedure section of this topic.

1. View related source statements

   Starting from a business term, view the related source to see the lines of code that reference the business term.

2. Document candidate rules

   Navigate the source view to look at source statements and associate candidate rules with statements that contain business logic that you need to track. Document the business logic for the candidate rule using defined business terms.

3. Create new terms
   As you navigate the source and associate source statements with rules you might find additional data elements of interest that need to be traced. Associate these data elements with business terms and continue the process of exploring the source for that term to find additional candidate business rules and terms.

   Tip: It is best practice to add new business terms to Rational® Asset Analyzer as soon as you find them so that you can use them to document the candidate rules in natural language text. For this reason, the task of documenting candidate rules is likely to be interrupted by the task of creating new terms. The practice of using the business terms in the natural language representation of the rule makes it easier to analyze the rules and to write structured rules.

1. After decision input and output data elements have been identified and associated with business terms, you need to prioritize the list of terms and start with a selected term by viewing the source statements that reference the term.
   Tip: It is best practice to document the candidate rules using consistent business terms that have been defined as terms or properties in Rational Asset Analyzer.
2. For each term selected, complete the cycle of mining for candidate rules by iterating through these steps. In this procedure, select the link for more information about each step:
   1. View related source statements
   2. Document candidate rules
   3. Create new terms