Automating the Synthesis of UML StateChart Diagrams from Multiple Collaboration Diagrams

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Automating the Synthesis of UML StateChart
Diagrams from Multiple Collaboration Diagrams

• Ismail Khriss, Mohammed Elkoutbi and Rudolf K.
  Keller
• UML Conference 1998
• 2002. 02.25
• Presented by Tegegne Marew

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Contents

• Introduction
• UML
• Description of the Approach
• Discussion of the Approach
• Conclusion and Future Work

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Introduction

• Currently, major aspects of oo development
• UML for oo notation and design
• UseCases for software development
• Central point of the paper
• Dynamic specification of objects from scenarios.

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UML

• Use Case Diagrams (UsecaseD)
• Interaction between system and actors
• Visualizing the context and the boundaries of the
  system
• Collaboration Diagrams (CollD)
• A particular series of interaction among objects
  in a single execution of a use case
• StateChart Diagram (StateD)
• Sequence of states an object goes through during
  its life cycle

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Library System Example(1/4)
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Library System Example(2/4)
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Library System Example(3/3)
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Description of the Approach

• Requirement Acquisition
• Develop all scenarios for each use case
• At the end, we have
• A set of use cases UC uc1,uc2,
• A set of objects OB ob1,ob2,
• A set of scenarios for each use case
  CD cd1,cd2,.

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Description of the Approach

• Generation of partial object specifications from
  scenarios
• Apply CTS (CollD to StateD) algorithm to each
  member of CD
• Create StateD for every class implied by the
  objects in CollD
• Introduces as state variables all variables which
  are not attributes of the objects
• creates transitions for the objects from which
  messages are sent
• creates transitions for the objects to which
  messages are sent
• bring for all StateDs the set of generated
  transitions into correct sequences, connecting
  them by states, split bars and merge bars.

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Description of the Approach
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Description of the Approach
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Description of the Approach

• Analysis of partial specifications
• Add state names (needed later)
• May add some structural information (e.g.
  grouping states)

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Description of the Approach
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Description of the Approach
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Description of the Approach
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Description of the Approach

• Object specification integration
• The most important part
• New algorithm
• validation of state names
• no state appears in the two StateDs at different
  levels of hierarchy.
• incorporation of scenario variables
• solves the problem of interleaving of scenarios
• integration of state variable lists
• integration of substate lists
• integration of transition lists.

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Description of the Approach

• Technique for avoiding interleaving problem
• Three composition variables
• ScenarioList a set of scenario names
• DynamicScenarioList initialized to ScenarioList,
  it captures the possible remaining scenarios.
• TransScenarioList array of set of scenario names
  concerned with each transition
• Each transition has variables
• sc(transScenarioListtr Ç dynamicScenarioList)
  ¹ f
• sadynamicScenarioList dynamicScenarioList Ç
  transScenarioListtr
• ra dynamicScenarioList ScenarioList

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Description of the Approach
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Description of the Approach
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Discussion of the Approach-(1/2)

• Validation of Approach
• Both algorithms have been implemented using the
  Java language
• Successfully applied to library system, ATM
  machine, filing system, and a gas station
  simulator
• State Name Based Integration
• Compared to other solutions, this is more general

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Discussion of the Approach-(2/2)

• Problem of interleaving between scenarios
• Solved by the introduction of composition
  variables
• Relevance of Approach in the development process
• Dynamic modeling is made easy
• Incremental modification helps to incorporate new
  scenarios discovered later

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Conclusion and Future Work

• Generates system specification from scenarios
• Scenarios may be concurrent
• It solves interleaving problem
• In future, coherence and completeness
  verification could be done