Proper, Erik
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Henderik Alex (Erik) Proper (born 22 May 1967) is a Dutch
computer scientist A computer scientist is a scientist who specializes in the academic study of computer science. Computer scientists typically work on the theoretical side of computation. Although computer scientists can also focus their work and research on ...
, a
FNR
PEARL Laureate, and a senior research manager within the Computer Science (ITIS) department of the Luxembourg Institute of Science and Technology (LIST). He is also adjunct professor in data and knowledge engineering at the University of Luxembourg. He is known for work on
conceptual modeling The term conceptual model refers to any model that is formed after a conceptualization or generalization process. Conceptual models are often abstractions of things in the real world, whether physical or social. Semantic studies are relevant to var ...
,
enterprise architecture Enterprise architecture (EA) is a business function concerned with the structures and behaviours of a business, especially business roles and processes that create and use business data. The international definition according to the Federation of ...
and
enterprise engineering Enterprise engineering is the body of knowledge, principles, and practices used to design all or part of an enterprise. R.E. Giachetti (2010). ''Design of Enterprise Systems: Theory, Methods, and Architecture''. CRC Press, Boca Raton, FL. An enterpr ...
.


Biography

Born in
Rheden Rheden () is a Municipalities of the Netherlands, municipality and a town in the eastern Netherlands. Population centres Population of the seven villages on 1 January 2024 Topography ''Dutch Topographic map of the municipality of Rheden, Ju ...
, Proper studied computer science at the
Radboud University Nijmegen Radboud University (abbreviated as RU, , formerly ) is a public university, public research university located in Nijmegen, Netherlands. RU has seven faculties and more than 24,000 students. Established in 1923, Radboud University has consistentl ...
. In 1990 he received his MSc, and in 1994 his PhD with distinction with a thesis entitled "A Theory for Conceptual Modelling of Evolving Application Domains" under supervision of Eckhard D. Falkenberg.Curriculum Vitae Prof.dr. Henderik A. Proper
/ref> After graduation, Proper started his academic as computer science researcher at the
University of Queensland The University of Queensland is a Public university, public research university located primarily in Brisbane, the capital city of the Australian state of Queensland. Founded in 1909 by the Queensland parliament, UQ is one of the six sandstone ...
in Australia, and lecturer at the
Queensland University of Technology The Queensland University of Technology (QUT) is a public university, public research university located in the city of Brisbane in Queensland, Australia. It has two major campuses, a modern city campus in Gardens Point, Brisbane, Gardens Point ...
. Back in The Netherlands in 1997 Proper started working in the software industry as consultant at
Atos Origin Atos SE is a European multinational information technology (IT) service and consulting company with headquarters in Bezons suburb of Paris, France, and offices worldwide. It specialises in hi-tech transactional services, unified communicatio ...
in Amsterdam, and later for Ordina in Gouda. He was appointed as an adjunct professor at the Radboud University in Nijmegen, where he became full professor of evolving information systems in 2002. From 2008 to 2010 he worked as a consultant for
Capgemini Capgemini SE is a French Multinational corporation, multinational information technology (IT) services and consulting company, headquartered in Paris, France. History Capgemini was founded by Serge Kampf in 1967 as an enterprise management and d ...
. In 2010 he became a senior researcher at the Public Research Centre Henri Tudor, which was later merged with Public Research Centre Gabriel Lippmann to become the
Luxembourg Institute of Science and Technology The Luxembourg Institute of Science and Technology (abbreviated as LIST) is a public research institute created on January 1, 2015, by the merger of the Henri-Tudor Public Research Center and the Gabriel-Lippmann Public Research Center, both in L ...
. Between 2008 and 2018, he also continued his affiliation with Radboud University as an adjunct professor. Since June 2017, he also holds an adjunct professorship in data and knowledge engineering at the University of Luxembourg. In 2012 Proper was awarded the IFIP Outstanding Service Award from the International Federation for Information Processing (IFIP). As of January 2022, Erik is vice-chair of the IFIP 8.1 working group, while also being the representative for the Netherlands in IFIP's TC8 technical committee. He is also the Stellvertretender Sprecher (vice chair) of the EMISA working group of the German Computer Science Society (Gesellschaft für Informatik).


Work


''A Theory for Conceptual Modelling of Evolving Application Domains,'' 1994

In his 1994 PhD thesis "A Theory for Conceptual Modelling of Evolving Application Domains," Proper developed a formal specification of information system development. This specification was based Object-role modeling, and was one of the many extensions to its basic framework. These extensions are basically abstract mechanisms, that "allow users to control the amount of detail seen at any given time."Halpin, Terry. "Object-role modeling (ORM/NIAM)." Handbook on architectures of information systems. Springer Berlin Heidelberg, 2006. 81-103. While Proper focussed on schema evolution with Object-role modeling, other researchers in the 1990s had focussed on a range of related topics. Halpin (2006) summarized that that research ranged from "reverse engineering, support for complex objects, process-event modeling, external schema generation... schema optimization, meta-modeling, subtype extensions, null handling, object-oriented mapping, unary nesting, [to] empirical research."


''Enterprise Architecture,'' 2009

In the 2009 "Enterprise Architecture: Creating Value by Informed Governance," Martin Op 't Land, Op 't Land and Proper traced the notion of architecture in the field of information systems development. They summarized:
When software applications became larger and larger, people such as Mary Shaw (computer scientist), Shaw and Garlan coined the term software architecture. This notion of architecture deals with the key design principles underlying software artefacts. In the 1980s and 1990s, people became aware that the development of information technology (IT) should be done in conjunction with the development of the context in which it was used. This led to the identification of the so-called business/IT alignment problem. Solving the business/IT alignment problem requires enterprises to align human, organizational, informational, and technological aspects of systems..."Martin Op 't Land, Erik Proper (2009) ''Enterprise Architecture: Creating Value by Informed Governance''. p. 26-27
And furthermore:
Quite early on, the term architecture was also introduced as a means to further alignment, and thus analyzes and solves business?IT alignment problems, Recently, the awareness emerged that alignment between business and IT is not enough, there are many more aspects in the enterprise in need of alignment. This has led to the use of the term architecture at the enterprise level: enterprise architecture.


''Architecture Principles,'' 2011

In "Architecture Principles – The Cornerstones of Enterprise Architecture," (2011) Danny Greefhorst, Greefhorst and Proper present an extensive study of architecture principles. They presume that "enterprises, from small to large, evolve continuously. As a result, their structures are transformed and extended continuously. Without some means of control, such changes are bound to lead to an overly complex, uncoordinated and heterogeneous environment that is hard to manage and hard to adapt to future changes. Enterprise architecture principles provide a means to direct transformations of enterprises. As a consequence, architecture principles should be seen as the cornerstones of any architecture."Greefhorst & Proper (2013, summary) Furthermore they argue, that this work "provide[s] both a theoretical and a practical perspective on architecture principles. The theoretical perspective involves a brief survey of the general concept of principle as well as an analysis of different flavors of principles. Architecture principles are regarded as a specific class of normative principles that direct the design of an enterprise, from the definition of its business to its supporting IT. The practical perspective on architecture principles is concerned with an approach to the formulation of architecture principles, as well as their actual use in organizations."


Publications

Proper has authored and co-authored numerous publications in the fields of
enterprise engineering Enterprise engineering is the body of knowledge, principles, and practices used to design all or part of an enterprise. R.E. Giachetti (2010). ''Design of Enterprise Systems: Theory, Methods, and Architecture''. CRC Press, Boca Raton, FL. An enterpr ...
,
enterprise architecture Enterprise architecture (EA) is a business function concerned with the structures and behaviours of a business, especially business roles and processes that create and use business data. The international definition according to the Federation of ...
and enterprise modelling. Books, a selection: * Proper, H. A.,
A Theory for Conceptual Modelling of Evolving Application Domains
'' Doctoral thesis Radboud University Nijmegen, 1994. * Proper, H. A., Martin Op ’t Land, Martin Op 't Land, Maarten Waage, Jeroen Cloo, and Claudia Steghuis. ''Enterprise Architecture – Creating Value by Informed Governance.'' With Berlin : Springer, 2008. * Proper, H. A., Roel Wieringa, Pascal van Eck and Claudia Steghuis.
Competences of IT Architects
'. With The Hague : Academic Service, 2008. * Proper, H. A. and Danny Greefhorst, ''Architecture Principles – The Cornerstones of Enterprise Architecture.'' With Berlin : Springer, 2011. Articles, a selection: * Ter Hofstede, A. H., Proper, H. A., & Van Der Weide, T. P. (1993)
Formal definition of a conceptual language for the description and manipulation of information models
Information Systems, 18(7), 489–523. * Halpin, Terry A., and Henderik Alex Proper.
Subtyping and polymorphism in object-role modelling
" Data & Knowledge Engineering 15.3 (1995): 251–281. * Jonkers, H., van Buuren, R., Arbab, F., De Boer, F., Bonsangue, M., Bosma, H., Ter Doest, H., Groenewegen, L., Scholten, J.G., Hoppenbrouwers, S., Iacob, M-A., Janssen, W., Marc Lankhorst, Lankhorst, M., Van Leeuwen, D., Proper, E., Stam, A., Van der Torre, L. & van Zanten, G. V. (September 2003)
Towards a language for coherent enterprise architecture descriptions
In Enterprise Distributed Object Computing Conference, 2003. Proceedings. Seventh IEEE International (pp. 28–37). IEEE. *


References


External links


Prof.dr. Henderik A. Proper
at erikproper.eu {{DEFAULTSORT:Proper, Henderik A. Dutch computer scientists Enterprise modelling experts 1967 births Living people Radboud University Nijmegen alumni Academic staff of Radboud University Nijmegen Academic staff of Queensland University of Technology People from Rheden 20th-century Dutch scientists 21st-century Dutch scientists