title: Process specification
text: # Process specification
  
  Process Specification is a generic term for the specification of a process. It is not unique to business activity, but can be applied to any organizational activity.
  
  Within some structured methods, the capitalized term Process Specification refers to a description of the procedure to be followed by an actor within an elementary level business activity, as represented on a process model such as a dataflow diagram or IDEF0 model. A common alias is minispec, short for miniature specification.
  
  ## Use in systems development
  
  The process specification defines what must be done to transform inputs into outputs. It is a detailed set of instructions outlining a business procedure that each elementary level business activity is expected to carry out. Process specifications are commonly included as integral components of requirements documents in systems development.
  
  ## Techniques
  
  A variety of approaches can be used to produce a process specification, including:
  
  * Decision tables
  * Structured English (favored technique of most systems analysts)
  * Pre/post conditions
  * Use cases, basic course or events/alternate paths in use cases
  * Flowcharts
  * Nassi–Shneiderman diagrams
  * UML Activity diagrams
  
  No matter what approach is used, a specification must communicate to system development designers, implementers and support professionals, and be verifiable by stakeholders and end users.
  
  