Service variations

[wouterdc]

Like in many (retail) webshops some public services in Flanders can have different variations. It can be compared to ordering an iPhone 13 (= product) online, where one can choose between different colours (= variations). An example in Flanders: by ordering service vouchers, civilians can choose between two variations:

• Service vouchers on paper
• Electronic service vouchers What’s the best way to model such things? We are thinking of defining something like a product and subproduct where in this case product=service vouchers, and subproducts are:
• Service vouchers on paper
• Electronic service vouchers

[bahimc]

Thanks for your comment, @wouterdc. Variations can be captured by different classes in the public service model. In your case, if I understand correctly, whether a service is offered electronically or via paper can be captured with the channel class.

[wouterdc]

Thanks for your feedback @bahimc, but in this example I wouldn’t use the channel relationship because it isn’t the medium the user interacts with the public service. To clarify:

• Service vouchers are something civilians can order at a (semi-) government agency (Sodexo) and can receive on paper or ‘electronic’ (more or less like a debit card). Afterwards it can be used to pay domestic help workers in a legal and tax friendly way. Ordering service vouchers can be done on the website of Sodexo, the (semi-) government agency that distributes service vouchers
• In my opinion ‘service vouchers’ should be the public service. The ‘website of Sodexo’ is a channel. ‘Service vouchers on paper’ and ‘Electronic service vouchers’ are what I mean with variations. It seems a bit weird to model that as channels.

Another example is a recognition to become an environmental expert (= public service). In that case a customer can request that recognition for different specialties (eg. Soil corrosion, sound&vibrations, …). Those specialties are examples of what I mean with variations.

[LouisMatha]

Thanks for your comment, @wouterdc. If I understand correctly your examples, you want to capture the variation of Output (exp: service vouchers or specialities recognition). This type of variation can be captured either by considering each variation as a different type of Output (foreseen in the model with the unbounded relationship between the Public Service and Output classes) or by setting the type attribute of the Output class. In the particular case of service vouchers, they can be considered as both Output ( since they can be bought in the interface of the Public Organization) and Evidence (since it is needed to order Public Services). Therefore, in this particular example, we would consider two Public Services: one to buy Service Vouchers (with service vouchers as Output) and another one to pay domestic help workers (with service vouchers as Evidence).