IDEF Structured Systems Analysis Diagrams

IDEF is an acronym meaning ICAM DEFinition, where ICAM is an acronym for Integrated Computer Aided Manufacturing. Developed by the US Air Force, IDEF is the most commonly used approach for CIMS design. IDEF0 is closely related to SADT.

The 7 IDEF standards are used to build the following:

• IDEF0....Functional Model
• IDEF1....Information Model
• IDEF1x.. Semantic Model (Databases)
• IDEF2....Dynamic Model (Simulation)
• IDEF3....Process Description
• IDEF4....Object Oriented Model
• IDEF5....Concept/Ontology Description
• IDEF6....Design Rationale Model

Note that IDEF3 and IDEF5 are Descriptive, while the rest are used to build a Model. IDEF1x was added later to address databases (also called Entity Relationship Diagrams).