Systems Engineering Demystified: A practitioner's handbook for developing complex systems using a model-based approach

Very well written text book clearly covered system engineering and MBSE.

I have owned and read many Systems Engineering books by this author. Often I can’t find them as they have been handed out to engineers of all levels who have asked “have you got a readable book on Systems Engineering?”.This latest edition is well organised (as you would expect from a leading authority on Systems Engineering, SE) covering all areas from introduction and motivation, concepts, techniques, methodologies and best practice. The textural and diagrammatic descriptions are supported by examples based on familiar systems, helping to drive home the ideas.There are two areas I particularly welcome in the book.Firstly, it is considering the application of SE to ‘complex’ systems! It is straightforward (but never the less useful) to apply SE to ‘complicated’ systems; whereas more thought is required for its application to truly ‘complex’ systems. So, it’s great to see the topic beginning to be addressed.Secondly, the book addresses aligning SE with a modern processing model, namely SAFe. I have seen, first hand, the benefit of applying SE and SAFe individually (or loosely coupled). Bringing these powerful paradigms closer together could provide added benefit.Seasoned practitioners will agree that establishing and maintaining all aspects of the topic areas covered in the book, so that it provides an efficient and effective application of SE takes a lot of knowledge, experience, collaboration and perseverance! This book provides valuable knowledge and experience gained by the author in the pursuit of applying SE.So, with Systems Engineering Demystified I have an up-to-date and modernised book on the topic that I can hand out to the next generation of engineers and managers who want to get to grips with this important and interesting topic area!

I have had the pleasure of seeing the author present another of his books at a conference and to have seen him teach systems engineering.This book is written with the vigour and clarity that he uses in his speaking and teaching about the subject matter. This makes the book a pleasurable read.More importantly this book is written with a pedagogical style that clearly benefits from the author's work as a teacher and trainer in systems engineering. It is clear that the book reflects his experience over the years of teaching the ideas described in the book, learned through trial and reflection upon what works, or is needed, to teach the ideas of MBSE to people ranging from the beginner, who needs to be guided into understanding the core concepts, through to the advanced learner and practitioner who needs guidance with particular details of systems engineering or MBSE. Another group of people who will benefit from the book is teachers of systems engineering who could use this book as a text or as their own guide for how to teach core ideas of systems engineering to their students.This book is about systems engineering in general and as practiced in its current form of MBSE. Part of the didactic benefit of this book is that it uses the notations of MBSE to help in communicating what systems engineering is, helping the reader to understand both.I hope to spend a lot more time using this book to help me with my work.

The authors have been in the model-based approach for systems engineering space for many years. The first book that I read by them was UML for Systems Engineering published in 2004. They followed that up in 2013 with SysML for Systems Engineering. Their latest book on this subject, Systems Engineering Demystified, is their best.This is not a SysML book. It is a systems engineering book. The first chapter introduces systems engineering with a unique twist – they use the OMG Systems Modeling Language (SysML) without telling you they are using SysML. Next, they begin to introduce the use of models in performing systems engineering – or MBSE. A significant departure from other books in this space where most books introduce a SysML diagram like the block diagram and then discuss how it should be used by systems engineers. The authors instead discuss the systems engineering task and demonstrate how to do this using the appropriate SysML diagram. Each chapter is presented in the same manner - here are the systems engineering approaches, and this is how you use models to accomplish that.The book is presented in a clear, concise manner. You do not have to have any previous knowledge of systems engineering. The entire systems engineering lifecycle is presented and the material is presented in a tool agnostic manner, so you will not have to be familiar with any specific tool to use this book. This is the book I would have written. The primary author, Jon Holt, is a university professor, and the book is written in a manner in which it can be used as a primary text for an introductory course for systems engineering at either the undergraduate or graduate level. If you do intend to use it to teach, the authors have made all their diagrams available in PDF so you can use them in your teaching materials.

Für den ersten Einstieg in System Engineering ist das Buch gut geschrieben. Leider sind viele Abbildungen verpixelt und schwer lesbar. Das darf nicht passieren, wenn man MBSE erklären will.