IDEA TREE TUTORIAL A PREVIEW OF THE DEMOS DEMO 1 - IDEA TREE COMMAND STRUCTURE Take a walk through a tree which shows you all of the actual IDEA TREE commands, including a quick reference explanation for each. DEMO 1 also shows you how to use this command tree as an on-line "help" reference. DEMO 2 - A BRIEF TUTORIAL ON IDEA ANALYSIS Starting with the idea "throw a lawn party", this tutorial takes you through the steps of developing, copying and moving a tree, and lets you get some "hands-on" experience with the program. DEMO 3 - A BUSINESS FUNCTIONAL DECOMPOSITION IDEA TREE has unlimited applications to your business activities: job descriptions, business operations management, organizational structure and even data processing requirements definition. DEMO 3 is a decomposition of an administrative business function and the creation of a job description from this decomposition. DEMO 4 - CORPORATE INFORMATION SYSTEMS The trees involved portray the functional responsibilites of corporate MIS, and the structure of an organization to carry out those responsibilities. USING THE DEMOS We'll assume that you've gotten through the installation process safely and now you're ready to go. You do not have to work through all four demos. However, we suggest that you complete Demos 1 and 2 before going ahead on your own. In the demo instructions, the command keys to be pressed are enclosed in single brackets, <>, and separated by commas. You only need to press the first letter of a command. Upper case and lower case command letters have the same effect. Words to be typed at the keyboard are enclosed in square brackets, []. Type only the word or command letter, not the brackets. The arrow keys, which are cursor movement commands, and the "home, "end", "enter" and "escape" keys, are represented as follows: - right arrow - left arrow - up arrow - down arrow - carriage return - escape - home - end QUITTING IDEA TREE 1 - Press o to, xit. 2 - Read the message on the screen and press or . STARTING IDEA TREE If you are using a hard disk system: 1 - [CD\IDEA]; this gets you into the IDEA directory. 2 - [IDEA], ; this loads IDEA TREE. With certain computers using DOS versions earlier than V.3.2, the main menu cursor may be hard to see or missing if you are not using a color monitor. In this case 1 - o to, xit, ; this exits IDEA TREE. 2 - Type [IDEA B], ; the program should load correctly. If you are using a floppy disk system, select the drive containing the IDEA TREE diskette, and then proceed as above. In the following demos, the IDEA TREE files you will be using should be either in the IDEA directory on a hard disk system, or on the IDEA TREE floppy diskette. DEMO 1 IDEA TREE COMMAND STRUCTURE IDEA TREE provides a set of commands which are easy to learn and use. Some of these commands allow you to create ideas as they naturally occur during the thought process. Other commands then allow you to rapidly rearrange these ideas into a logical sequence of thoughts and actions. Commands are grouped under main command names on the main menu depending on the common functions shared by each group. For instance, selecting the emove command from the main menu pops down a submenu of commands which specify what can be removed. The DEMO1 tree file contains only one tree, which has been titled "HELP". This is a complete breakdown of the IDEA TREE command structure. Each idea you of this tree is a brief explanation of a command used in IDEA TREE, with an attached note providing a more detailed explanation of the command. You can use this tree for on-line help by loading it into your computer's memory when you start IDEA TREE, or at any point during an IDEA TREE session. You can then work on your own trees and refer to this "command tree" whenever you need help remembering what a certain command does. To look at the "command tree" and get used to using it, follow the steps outlined below. 1 - [DEMO1], ; loads the DEMO1 file and displays the first page of its tree. What you have here is a quick reference to the complete set of IDEA TREE commands. You may either print this tree and its notes to use as a hardcopy quick reference, or load it into memory when using IDEA TREE as an on-line quick reference. To print the HELP tree: 1 - Turn your printer on. Make sure it is loaded with 8 1/2" x 11" continuous feed paper and that the print head is lined up with the top of a page. 2 -

rint, ree, ; the entire tree will be printed. For more information about tracking your way through the printed tree, see Section III.8.

rint in the user's manual. Moving Through The Tree The highlight you see over the words "Go to" on the top left of the display is called the main menu cursor. To move the main menu cursor from one command to another, either press the key or press and simultaneously. You can select a command from the main menu by either moving the highlight to the command and pressing , or simply pressing the first letter of the command. The highlight you see over the top idea, "IDEA TREE command structure", is called the idea cursor. To move the idea cursor around the tree, just press the arrow keys. Many of the ideas in this tree feature a small letter "n" in their lower right border. This "n" indicates that there is a page of text attached to a particular idea. Let's display a "note": 1 - ; this moves the idea cursor from the top idea to the furthest left idea on the next level down. 2 - dit, ote; a page of text is displayed. If you select these commands when the idea cursor is over a position which does not feature an "n", a blank page will be displayed. 3 - or ; pressing returns you to the previous tree display without saving any changes you may have made to the note. Pressing returns you to the previous tree display, but any changes you may have made to the note are saved. The tree is organized to represent the actual structure of IDEA TREE's commands. The the first level of the tree (the page "root"), describes the general concept of the whole tree. The second level, reading from left to right, briefly describes each of the main menu commands in the order in which they appear on the main menu. The third level, reading from top to bottom, briefly describes the sub commands available for each main menu command. The attached notes provide a more detailed explanation of each command. To use the HELP tree for on-line help: 1 - After starting up IDEA TREE, load the DEMO1 file into memory just as described above. You can then load other files and display the trees you want to work on, or create and display new trees and files. 2 - Press o to, ree; this displays the list of currently loaded trees. Select the tree at the top of the list. The tree at the top of the list will be the HELP tree if it is the first tree you load after starting IDEA TREE. Go on to the next demo. DEMO 2 A BRIEF TUTORIAL ON IDEA TREE ANALYSIS Most ideas worth thinking about have some degree of complexity. The objective of idea tree analysis is to organize this complexity by identifying its component pieces. Such an organization is called a "decomposition". As you carry out this process, one of the things you discover is that the process itself leads you to new ideas about the idea you're decomposing. Let's suppose we want to throw a lawn party. Here are some of the things that come immediately to mind: invite guests arrange food and drink arrange music 1 - ile, oad; a field for file name entry appears on the screen. 2 - [DEMO2],; loads a file named DEMO2. 3 - o to, ree; displays a menu that lists the titles of all trees in this file. The list looks like this: FILE TITLE DESCRIPTION DEMO1 COMMANDS Idea Tree command structure HELP Idea Tree command structure DEMO2 Lawn Party decomposition analysis tutorial step 1 lawn party step 2 *invite guests step 3 *invite guests step 4 *invite guests The line, "DEMO2, lawn party, decomposition", etc., shows you the DOS file name of the newly loaded file - "DEMO2", the title we have given the file - "Lawn Party", and a brief description of the contents of the file, "decomposition analysis tutorial". The next line, beginning with the words, "step 1", is the title and description of the first tree in the DEMO2 file. The DEMO2 file contains four trees altogether, "step 1", "step 2", "step 3" and "step 4". These trees were created to illustrate each stage of the demo tree development. 1 - ; moves the bar cursor. Press until the cursor is over the tree title "step1". 2 - ; selects and displays this tree. The tree now displayed has been titled "step1". In this tree, the food and drink item has been split into "provide food" and "provide drink". The result is that the second level of the idea has four sub ideas, and each of these, obviously, will have further sub ideas of its own. Let's think some more about the first one, "invite guests". This calls for making up a guest list, getting invitations and then mailing them. We'll use IDEA TREE to show you how each stage of the tree development might look. The "step 2" tree shows the breakdown of the "invite guests" idea. Select o to ree to display the "step 2" tree. Now select o to ree to display the "step 3" tree. This will take you to the tree titled "step3", where you can see that the process has been carried a step further; the guest list idea has been broken down into three sub ideas, two of which you can see on the screen. The arrow near the bottom of the screen indicates that there are additional ideas under "make up guest list" besides the two you can see. The single idea at the top of your screen is the root idea for this "invite guests" tree. The three ideas below it form the second level of the tree. The ideas under "make up guest list" are at the third level. Any ideas below these will be at the fourth level, and so on. An idea tree can consist of any number of levels, limited only by your imagination and your computer's available memory. To display the tree, IDEA TREE shows you three levels at a time, consisting of the top idea, or root, and a second and third level of ideas. These make up a page. What you are looking at now is a page root idea (page level 1), three page level 2 ideas, and two page level 3 ideas. This page actually has three ideas at page level 3. The arrow at the bottom of the screen tells you that there are more ideas at this third level. Press four times to scroll the display and move the idea cursor down to the third idea on level 3. Let's take this process through one more step - "send the cards". This idea is on the right side of your screen at page level 2. This calls for getting addresses, writing invitations, and addressing the envelopes. 1 - o to, ree; displays the list of trees in this file. 2 - ; Press until the bar cursor is over the tree title "step4". 3 - ; selects and displays this tree. The level 3 ideas under "send the cards" express these actions. The first level 3 idea is "get addresses". Some of these addresses will come from Joan, some from yourself and some from the office. The arrow to the right of this idea box tells you that there are sub ideas for it. 1 - , ; this moves the idea cursor to "get addresses". 2 - ; this moves you to a new page that repeats the "get addresses" idea as its root, and then shows the next level of the overall tree. The three ideas at this level detail the sources for the addresses. 3 - to return to the parent page. The next idea at page level 3 under "send the cards" is "write the invitations & addresses". If it's a big party you may need help, so let's list the manpower as a set of sub ideas for "write the invitations & addresses". 1 - Press ; moves the cursor down to the idea "write the invitations and addresses". 2 - Press ew, ight; creates a new page, displays the parent idea as the page root, creates a new idea position and enters the edit mode. Let's include the names of people who might help: 1 - [Joan], ; the name Joan is displayed in the new idea box. 2 - ew, ight; creates a new idea position, and enters the edit mode. 3 - [Adrian], ; the name Adrian is displayed in its new box. 4 - Press ew, ight, [yours truly], . You should now be looking at a list of helpers. Now let's see where we are. Type: 1 - o to, oot; this moves the idea cursor to the top of the "invite guests" tree. "invite guests" is one of the major components of our overall idea, and what you see is the top three levels of its development into sub ideas representing clearly defined, do-able actions. You can only see three levels at a time, but the small arrows on the display show you where to move the idea cursor to see the rest. But what about the bigger picture? "invite guests" is just one part of the "lawn party" idea tree. Therefore, let's put this tree into that one so we can see "invite guests" in the context of the "lawn party" idea. 1 - o to, ree; this takes you back to the list of all trees in memory. 2 - ; press until the bar cursor is moved over the "step 1" tree title, which is where our lawn party idea started out. 3 - ; the "step 1" tree is displayed. Now let's move the detail of the "step 4" tree into the "step 1" tree. 1 - ; moves the cursor to the "invite guests" idea box. 2 - ree,

lace; selects the Tree Place function, and displays all of the trees that are available. You might notice that the tree we're in (it's called "step1") isn't shown, because you can't place a tree into itself. Another point: the two trees, "step2" and "step3" don't have anything to do with solving the problem. They're only in this file to show the creation of a tree, one step at a time. The tree we want to place into our "lawn party" tree is "step4". 3 - ; moves the bar cursor to the tree "step4" at the bottom of the list. 4 - ; selects the tree "step4" for placement. You now are returned to the original tree ("step1") and questioned as to whether you want to move or copy the selected tree ("step4"). 5 - ove; moves all of the ideas of the selected tree into a new position to the right of the cursor, where it becomes a sub idea of "lawn party". It also erases the tree "step4" from memory. You can check that out by pressing o to ree; "step4" is no longer in the list of trees. Press to return to where we were. There are many ways of merging and combining trees in IDEA TREE. The one we have just used duplicated the "invite guests" idea. The next two steps fix that: 6 - ; moves the idea cursor to the duplicate "invite guests" idea. 7 - emove,

osition; removes this idea, box and all. Idea decomposition analysis is like brainstorming: something interesting comes up, you make a note of it, develop it a little, then let it sit while you go on to another part of the problem. Periodically, you merge the pieces into a larger whole. The process not only suggests further detail, but as you work you will see that certain ideas are more or less important than you first thought; that groups of ideas need to be relocated; subsets within groups need rearranging; and so on. There are three basic components to an idea: 1 - the action 2 - the object of the action 3 - responsibility for carrying it out Try to make your tree reflect an orderly progression down to a level of detail where each of these elements are inarguably specific, either separately or in combination. With this in mind you'll find that you can use IDEA TREE to create, structure, analyze and document reports, books, catalogs, projects and processes, business procedures, organizational structures, job analyses, functional decompositions, database planning, system architecture...there's really no limit. At this point you should have a basic understanding of some of the main commands and uses of IDEA TREE. If you like, you can stop at this point in the tutorial and plunge into creating your own trees. If you want to go on to the next demo: 1 - emove, ile; a message pops up asking if you want to remove the currently displayed file. 2 - [Y]; the list of trees in memory is displayed. At this point, only the DEMO1 file should still be in memory. You must select the tree in the file. 3 - ; the HELP tree is selected and displayed. 4 - ile, oad, [DEMO3]; the DEMO3 file is loaded. 5 - o to, ree, , ; the tree list is displayed. Move the bar cursor to the first tree in the DEMO3 file with the arrow key and press . The tree is displayed. DEMO 3 A BUSINESS FUNCTIONAL DECOMPOSITION This tree describes a specific business activity, "Administrative functions". We can use this tree to define jobs for individuals in the organization responsible for this activity. The second level of the tree is a good place to begin, since it implies some individual organizational elements. One possible job involves the management of billing. Let's create a job description from this organizational description: 1 - With the arrow keys, move the idea cursor to the "Manage Billing" idea on level 2. 2 - ree, efine, ranch; this defines the "Manage Billing" idea and its dependent children so that they can be manipulated separately from the rest of the tree. 3 - opy; a tree title page is displayed. 4 - [Billing Manager], . The defined branch is copied into its own tree under this title. 5 - Press o to ree. This takes you to the list of available trees. Move the bar cursor to "Billing Manager" with the arrow keys and press . The "Billing Manager" tree is now displayed. This is a copy of the branch we defined in the original "Admin functions" tree. Since this is a separate tree, we can modify and reorganize it without affecting the "Admin functions" tree. You can look at a modified version of this tree in "DEMO3.1". 1 - o to, ree; the tree list is displayed. 2 - ; move the bar cursor to "demo 3.1". 3 - ; the tree is loaded. This is a copy of the "Billing Manager" tree which has been changed into a job description. The first step was to modify the root idea to read "Manage Billing Operations". Next, we recast the invoicing and credit functions into a context that reflects the tasks required to manage their execution. Finally, we added some jobs that reflect the fact that there is a management to which this manager reports. Now let's put this job description into its own file. 1 - ree, ile create; the tree titled "demo 3.1" has been moved from the "DEMO3" file into a file of its own. 2 - o to, ree; as you can see, this new file has no name, title, or description. 3 - ; the "demo3.1" tree is displayed again. 4 - dit, ile title, [Job Descriptions], ; the file title page is displayed. Type in the file's name and move the bar cursor to the data entry field next to "FILE NAME". 5 - [jobs], ; the file has been given the name "jobs". The first tree of this file, "demo 3.1", is redisplayed. The new file name now appears in the upper left hand corner of the main menu. 1 - ile, ave; you are asked if you want to edit the file title. 2 - , ; the tree will be saved to disk as a new file called JOBS.TNS. You can reload this file in a later IDEA TREE session by selecting the proper directory with the ile ew path command, followed by the ile oad command using the file name [JOBS]. If you want to go on to the next demo: 1 - emove, ile; a message pops up asking if you want to remove the currently displayed file. 2 - [Y]; the list of trees in memory is displayed. At this point, only the DEMO1 file should still be in memory. You must select the tree in the file. 3 - ; the HELP tree is selected and displayed. 4 - ile, oad, [DEMO4]; the DEMO4 file is loaded. 5 - o to, ree, , ; the tree list is displayed. Move the bar cursor to the first tree in the DEMO4 file with the arrow key and press . The tree is displayed. DEMO 4 CORPORATE INFORMATION SYSTEMS Today, most large organizations experience the need to acquire, organize, support and manage data and information systems at a corporate level. The "DEMO4" tree file contains two trees: the first describes the functional needs of corporate information management for a company, and the second describes the organizational structure needed to carry out these functional responsibilities. If you are involved in corporate data management, you should be able to modify this tree to fit your needs. Once you have the functions defined to a suitable level of detail, you can turn to the question of an organization to support it. 1 - o to, ree; the list of trees is displayed. 2 - ; press to move the bar cursor to "Corp. MIS Organization". 3 - ; the second tree is now displayed. By cycling back and forth between these two trees, you can see how the intimate relationship between function and organization can be easily forged using IDEA TREE. As a final thought, if you construct a file of job description trees for the jobs implied in "Corp. MIS Organization" and then load that file with this one, you will have a three-way relationship between function, organization and job description.