Knowledge-based scenario management — Process and support

Scenario planning is a widely accepted management process for decision support activities. Though conventional decision support systems provide a strong database, modeling and visualization capabilities for the decision maker, they do not explicitly support scenario management. We propose an integrated life cycle approach for knowledge-based scenario-driven decision support incorporating three interrelated frameworks at different abstraction levels to support this process. The macro-level knowledge-based framework guides the Meso-level Scenario-driven framework, and these two in turn guide and inform the micro-level process-oriented framework. We develop a domain independent, component-based, and layered architecture to support the scenario management process and framework. The framework and architecture are realized through a concrete prototype.