3.4. Baselines versus structures in SIVI AFS

The comprehensive AFD model supports the modeling of various aspects within financial services, including nearly all aspects related to policies and contracts. This generic AFD model does not impose any specific arrangements regarding the ordering and use of entities and attributes.

Structures

Based on the AFD model, the AFD-structures are defined. An AFD-structure is designed with a specific business domain in mind. It comprises a subset of entities and attributes from the AFD model that are recognized as relevant to the specific domain. For example, the AFD-structure ‘policyStructure’ defines all attributes related to a policy. Within an AFD-structure, there are specific arrangements for the ordering and use of entities and attributes. AFD-structures play an important role in the SIVI AFS API-framework. The foundation of a well-defined API architecture is that functions are defined based on the specific data set to which the function applies. The purpose of using AFD-structures is to provide a framework for these data sets. The remainder of this chapter provides an overview of the currently available AFD-structures.

Baselines

A specification of an AFD-structure is called an AFD-baseline. The AFD-baseline ‘policyStructure-motorVehicle’ consists of all relevant entities and attributes for vehicle insurance. It also takes into account aspects such as enumeration, mandatory use, and value range. AFD-baselines can be defined in a hierarchical setting:

Currently only level 1 and 2 are supported in SIVI AFS.

Specifications

A specification of an AFD-structure for a service (for instance, the premium calculation of a specific insurance) or for registration (for instance, the registration of the policy for this insurance in a NoSQL database) is called an AFD-definition. The AFD-definition Standard provides a framework for specification and validation in two parts:

1. JSON Schema: specifications regarding structure, entities, and attributes.
2. JMESPath: specifications of relationship checks between attributes that cannot be specified in JSON Schema.
   The combination of the above two provides a precise definition that can be used by developers when implementing the handling of services, the storage of data, or defining dialogues (see for more details).
   

AOS

The online SIVI tool AOS (AFD Online Samenstellen) facilitates the specification of AFD-definitions. Through a more or less drag-and-drop process, users can define an AFD-definition. The starting point for this process is the available AFD-baselines in AOS. For instance, when selecting the AFD-baseline ‘policyStructure-motorVehicle,’ users can only select legitimate AFD elements related to the vehicle domain, taking into account aspects such as enumeration, mandatory use, and value range. See for more details on the SIVI tool AOS.

afsStructure

While the majority of the specifications for services and registration will fall within the boundaries of the domain-specific AFD-structures, there are many situations where the use of the AFD is desirable but does not fit with an available AFD-structure. In these cases, one can use the generic afsStructure. The afsStructure reflects the complete AFD model and permits any ordering of elements. If one wants to develop a service or specify a registration and does not find a fit with the existing AFD-structures, the steps are:

1. Contact SIVI to discuss whether an extension of the AFD should take place.
2. If not, use the afsStructure to define the needed structure.
   

Within the SIVI tool AOS, one can create an AFD-definition using the afsStructure by selecting it from the main screen. The afsStructure'is essentially the union of all available AFD-baselines, but it imposes no limitations regarding enumeration, mandatory use, and value range. This ensures that when using an afsStructure, there is as much alignment as possible with existing principles, though overriding is permitted. SIVI cannot foresee all variants, so it is advised to contact SIVI to evaluate whether it is possible for SIVI to update the afsStructure for you or whether you should complete the AFD-definition manually. AFD-definitions using the AFD-structure afsStructure that are made manually can be sent to SIVI for manual certification.

More information about the afsStructure is available in afsStructure.