DOCSLIB.ORG

Masarykova Univerzita Fakulta Informatiky UML Modeling Tools For

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Masarykova Univerzita Fakulta Informatiky UML Modeling Tools For Masarykova univerzita Fakulta informatiky UML modeling tools for blind people Bakalářská práce ukáš Tyrychtr 2017 Prohlašuji, že tato práce je mým původním autorským dílem, které jsem vypracoval(a) samostatně. Všechny zdroje, prameny a literaturu, které jsem při vypracování používal(a) nebo z nich čerpal(a), v práci řádně cituji s uvedením úplného odkazu na příslušný zdroj. Tato práce se zabývá nástroji použitelnými nevidomými při tvorbě a procházení již existujících UML diagramů. Práce shrnuje stav použitelných nejen softwarových nástrojů použitelných při prezentaci UML diagramů, a rovněž představuje výsledky studie použitelnosti PlantUML. Klíčová slova: UML, nástroje, nevidomí, přístupnost, PlantUML Table of contents Table of contents ................................................................................................................................. 4 Introduction ......................................................................................................................................... 5 About UML .......................................................................................................................................... 5 Current tools and state of the research .............................................................................................. 6 UML diagram presentation approaches .......................................................................................... 6 Software tools ................................................................................................................................. 6 PlantUML ........................................................................................................................................... 12 Syntax ............................................................................................................................................ 12 The syntax choices ......................................................................................................................... 30 PlantUML and visually impaired users .............................................................................................. 30 The questions ................................................................................................................................ 30 The subjects ................................................................................................................................... 31 The questioning ............................................................................................................................. 31 The questions and their answers .................................................................................................. 31 Visual aspects of the PlantUML output ............................................................................................. 43 Conclusions ........................................................................................................................................ 44 Appendix ............................................................................................................................................ 45 PlantUML Installation note ............................................................................................................ 45 Resources .......................................................................................................................................... 46 4 Introduction Despite UML being so ubiquitous in the software engineering community, not much research has gone towards finding how a blind user can cooperate with his colleagues. This work thus wants to present the current available tools and then assess in more detail the usability of PlantUML in cooperation between blind users and their colleagues while understanding a moderately complex diagram and suggest possible improvements to make the cooperation more streamlined. Such improvements may include suggestions for syntax changes, diagram organization guidelines and other suggestions. This work first explains the current state of this area – presentation approaches, current software tools and it also presents a quick PlantUML syntax refresher. The second major part presents the results of a survey of PlantUML users, particularly visually impaired ones, but the visual presentation is also looked at briefly. About UML "The Unified Modeling Language (UML) is a general-purpose visual modeling language that is used to specify, visualize, construct, and document the artifacts of a software system. It captures decisions and understanding about systems that must be constructed. It is used to understand, design, browse, configure, maintain, and control information about such systems." (1) It was created to centralize the various existing representations and in 2005 it was accepted as a ISO standard (2). UML defines a few visualization types, some are used more than others. Before continuing with a more thorough exploration of the software aspect of UML, the following paragraphs briefly describe the diagram types defined by the UML specification. The use case diagram describes on a high level the usage scenarios of a software system and their actors. It can help making sense of the required entities and the functionality needed. The sequence diagram describes a set of sequential steps of a process by showing the individual interactions. It is not usually created for each part of the system, but it can help in more complex cases. The communication diagram is like the sequence diagram, but it focuses more on the passed messages. It is possible to express a communication flow by both diagram types. The communication overview diagram also shows some business process, but on a higher level of interaction. Instead of individual steps it shows individual interaction diagrams (activity, sequence etc.). The timing diagram shows a sequence of events roughly as a sequence diagram, but when more objects are involved it helps to highlight the timing relations. In an activity diagram you usually display a part of a functionality in more detail including all the conditions, loops and other flow control elements, but you do not perform this for each function. 5 A state diagram represents the possible states and their transitions in a part of a system or some of its objects. As such, it is also known as the state machine diagram. A class diagram depicts the overall class hierarchy and the relationships within it. It might be more detailed including class attributes and methods, but this detailed analysis is usually done only in a later planning stage and maybe not for all classes. It is one of the most common diagram types used. An object diagram is somewhat like a class diagram, so it also shows class relations, but in this case concrete instances of the classes are used. It can help in understanding some more complex data relationships. A component diagram shows the relationships between larger system components (databases, application servers etc.) and the interfaces used. In a deployment diagram the relationships and aspects of the hardware of the system are shown. It is used when the software system requires a multi-machine setup with the hardware nodes being different in some way. The package diagram is used to show the application namespace structure and the imports between the individual packages. The composite structure diagram is used to show the composite structure of a class. The profile diagram was added in the UML 2.0 specification. It is used to customize the UML metamodels somewhat, for example to allow only single inheritance. It mainly consists of stereotypes, tagged values and constraints. Current tools and state of the research UML diagram presentation approaches When it comes to presenting the UML diagram to a visually impaired user, there are basically two options. First, a tactile image is used (3). This approach is sensitive to the diagram complexity, because the result can quickly get incomprehensible for the visually impaired reader. And it takes somewhat longer to create. Those diagrams may be created by hand, or a braille embosser can be used. On the other hand, a properly selected software tool can support both visual and accessible representation, thus making the communication much easier. Software tools There are basically three categories of tools used. The first category is probably the most numerous containing all the software which all the other (e. g. developers with sight) use. One of them, if written well, could integrate some sort of accessibility support. The second class is a specialized application which allows the user to have some spoken representation of the diagram, while also displaying it visually. This category of tools is rare, and the results of development have not been promising so far. The European Union started a project in this category of development in 2001 (4), but its results were evaluated as a failure and the project was 6 stopped in 2005. It has managed to produce a viewer application, called Accessible UML, which supports viewing of class, sequence and use case diagrams both as a list of elements with some additional information (connections, attributes etc.), and as a graphical view. However, the application does not support creating and editing operations. The other category of tools uses textual input and produces an image of the resulting diagram. The category of textual UML tools is numerous, as can be seen from the list at (5). However, not many tools support
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Communication Diagram.Pdf
    TU2943: Information Engineering Methodology Lab Notes, 2009-2010, Faculty of Technology and Information Science, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia LAB 5: Interaction Diagram - UML Communication Diagram OBJECTIVES To understand the role of dynamic models in requirement analysis by reading and constructing UML Communication Diagram. INTRODUCTION Communication Diagram (a.k.a. Collaboration Diagram) Communication Diagram provides another way to model a scenario. Essentially is a part of Interaction Diagram (just like Sequence Diagram). Each object is represented by an object icon, and links are used to indicate communication paths on which messages are transmitted. Messages presented in the same way as those in sequence diagram. Formerly known as Collaboration Diagram in UML 1.x specification. Communication Diagram represents a combination of information taken from Use Case, Class and Sequence Diagrams describing both the static structure and dynamic behavior of the system. Comparing and Contrasting: Collaboration and Sequence Both diagrams show the same information: Objects/classes Messages Sequence Conditional Repetition Messages to self Sequence Diagram and Communication Diagram are two views of the same scenario. Collaboration diagrams emphasize who-is-talking-to-who. But the time-ordering of the messages who gets obscured. Sequence diagrams emphasize time-ordering. But the who-is-talking-to-who gets obscured. Use the diagram that you are most comfortable with. Structure and Notation of Communication Diagram Objects are named <an object name>:< its class> . Nor Samsiah Binti Sani 1 TU2943: Information Engineering Methodology Lab Notes, 2009-2010, Faculty of Technology and Information Science, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia Either <an object name> or <a class name> can be removed. Collaborations / communications are shown by lines between objects.
    [Show full text]
  • Development of an Entity Component System Architecture for Realtime Simulation
    Fachbereich 4: Informatik Development of an Entity Component System Architecture for Realtime Simulation Bachelorarbeit zur Erlangung des Grades Bachelor of Science (B.Sc.) im Studiengang Computervisualistik vorgelegt von Trevor Hollmann Erstgutachter: Prof. Dr.-Ing. Stefan Müller (Institut für Computervisualistik, AG Computergraphik) Zweitgutachter: Kevin Keul, M.Sc. (Institut für Computervisualistik, AG Computergraphik) Koblenz, im September 2019 Erklärung Ich versichere, dass ich die vorliegende Arbeit selbständig verfasst und keine anderen als die angegebenen Quellen und Hilfsmittel benutzt habe. Ja Nein Mit der Einstellung der Arbeit in die Bibliothek bin ich einverstanden. .................................................................................... (Ort, Datum) (Unterschrift) Abstract The development of a game engine is considered a non-trivial problem. [3] The architecture of such simulation software must be able to manage large amounts of simulation objects in real-time while dealing with “crosscutting concerns” [3, p. 36] between subsystems. The use of object oriented paradigms to model simulation objects in class hierar- chies has been reported as incompatible with constantly changing demands dur- ing game development [2, p. 9], resulting in anti-patterns and eventual, messy re-factoring. [13] Alternative architectures using data oriented paradigms re- volving around object composition and aggregation have been proposed as a result. [13, 9, 1, 11] This thesis describes the development of such an architecture with the explicit goals to be simple, inherently compatible with data oriented design, and to make reasoning about performance characteristics possible. Concepts are for- mally defined to help analyze the problem and evaluate results. A functional implementation of the architecture is presented together with use cases common to simulation software. Zusammenfassung Die Entwicklung einer Spiele-Engine wird als nichttriviales Problem betrach- tet.
    [Show full text]
  • Component Diagrams in UML
    9. UML Component Diagrams Page 1 of 4 Component Diagrams in UML The previous articles covered two of the three primary areas in which the UML diagrams are categorized (see Article 1)—Static and Dynamic. The remaining two UML diagrams that fall under the category of Implementation are the Component and Deployment diagrams. In this article, we will discuss the Component diagram. Basics The different high-level reusable parts of a system are represented in a Component diagram. A component is one such constituent part of a system. In addition to representing the high-level parts, the Component diagram also captures the inter- relationships between these parts. So, how are component diagrams different from the previous UML diagrams that we have seen? The primary difference is that Component diagrams represent the implementation perspective of a system. Hence, components in a Component diagram reflect grouping of the different design elements of a system, for example, classes of the system. Let us briefly understand what criteria to apply to model a component. First and foremost, a component should be substitutable as is. Secondly, a component must provide an interface to enable other components to interact and use the services provided by the component. So, why would not a design element like an interface suffice? An interface provides only the service but not the implementation. Implementation is normally provided by a class that implements the interface. In complex systems, the physical implementation of a defined service is provided by a group of classes rather than a single class. A component is an easy way to represent the grouping together of such implementation classes.
    [Show full text]
  • Using the UML for Architectural Description?
    Using the UML for Architectural Description? Rich Hilliard Integrated Systems and Internet Solutions, Inc. Concord, MA USA [email protected] Abstract. There is much interest in using the Unified Modeling Lan- guage (UML) for architectural description { those techniques by which architects sketch, capture, model, document and analyze architectural knowledge and decisions about software-intensive systems. IEEE P1471, the Recommended Practice for Architectural Description, represents an emerging consensus for specifying the content of an architectural descrip- tion for a software-intensive system. Like the UML, IEEE P1471 does not prescribe a particular architectural method or life cycle, but may be used within a variety of such processes. In this paper, I provide an overview of IEEE P1471, describe its conceptual framework, and investigate the issues of applying the UML to meet the requirements of IEEE P1471. Keywords: IEEE P1471, architectural description, multiple views, view- points, Unified Modeling Language 1 Introduction The Unified Modeling Language (UML) is rapidly maturing into the de facto standard for modeling of software-intensive systems. Standardized by the Object Management Group (OMG) in November 1997, it is being adopted by many organizations, and being supported by numerous tool vendors. At present, there is much interest in using the UML for architectural descrip- tion: the techniques by which architects sketch, capture, model, document and analyze architectural knowledge and decisions about software-intensive systems. Such techniques enable architects to record what they are doing, modify or ma- nipulate candidate architectures, reuse portions of existing architectures, and communicate architectural information to others. These descriptions may the be used to analyze and reason about the architecture { possibly with automated support.
    [Show full text]
  • The Guide to Succeeding with Use Cases
    USE-CASE 2.0 The Guide to Succeeding with Use Cases Ivar Jacobson Ian Spence Kurt Bittner December 2011 USE-CASE 2.0 The Definitive Guide About this Guide 3 How to read this Guide 3 What is Use-Case 2.0? 4 First Principles 5 Principle 1: Keep it simple by telling stories 5 Principle 2: Understand the big picture 5 Principle 3: Focus on value 7 Principle 4: Build the system in slices 8 Principle 5: Deliver the system in increments 10 Principle 6: Adapt to meet the team’s needs 11 Use-Case 2.0 Content 13 Things to Work With 13 Work Products 18 Things to do 23 Using Use-Case 2.0 30 Use-Case 2.0: Applicable for all types of system 30 Use-Case 2.0: Handling all types of requirement 31 Use-Case 2.0: Applicable for all development approaches 31 Use-Case 2.0: Scaling to meet your needs – scaling in, scaling out and scaling up 39 Conclusion 40 Appendix 1: Work Products 41 Supporting Information 42 Test Case 44 Use-Case Model 46 Use-Case Narrative 47 Use-Case Realization 49 Glossary of Terms 51 Acknowledgements 52 General 52 People 52 Bibliography 53 About the Authors 54 USE-CASE 2.0 The Definitive Guide Page 2 © 2005-2011 IvAr JacobSon InternationAl SA. All rights reserved. About this Guide This guide describes how to apply use cases in an agile and scalable fashion. It builds on the current state of the art to present an evolution of the use-case technique that we call Use-Case 2.0.
    [Show full text]
  • Guidelines for UML Or Sysml Modelling Within an Enterprise Architecture
    Guidelines for UML or SysML modelling within an enterprise architecture Mälardalen University Academy of Innovation, Design and Technology Author: Charlie Höglund Email: [email protected] Bachelor of Science in Computer Science/Basic level, 15hp Date: 2017-06-08 Examiner: Jan Carlson Supervisor: Daniel Sundmark Company supervisor: Fredric Andréasson (Volvo Construction Equipment) Abstract Enterprise Architectures (EA) are used to describe an enterprise’s structure in a standardized way. An Enterprise Architecture also provides decision-support when choosing a direction or making changes at different levels of an enterprise, such as the business architecture or technology architecture level. This can involve decisions such as: What kind of enterprise should this be, what kind of technologies should be used for new system developments etcetera. Therefore, using the Unified Modelling Language (UML) or Systems Modelling Language (SysML) together with standardized guidelines that help you decide what to do before, during, and after modelling could be important for producing correct and useful system models, which later on will be used to develop actual systems. At the moment, standardized guidelines of this kind do not really exist. However, there are a lot of information about why you should use UML or SysML, what kinds of UML or SysML diagrams that exist, or what notations to follow when creating a specific UML or SysML diagram. In this thesis, the objective has been to research about the usefulness and creation of standardized guidelines for UML or SysML modelling in an Enterprise Architecture (i.e. mainly intended for the automotive industry domain). For this reason, the two research questions: “how can you create useful standardized guidelines for UML or SysML modelling?” and “what do useful standardized guidelines for UML or SysML modelling look like?” were chosen.
    [Show full text]
  • OMG Systems Modeling Language (OMG Sysml™) Tutorial 25 June 2007
    OMG Systems Modeling Language (OMG SysML™) Tutorial 25 June 2007 Sanford Friedenthal Alan Moore Rick Steiner (emails included in references at end) Copyright © 2006, 2007 by Object Management Group. Published and used by INCOSE and affiliated societies with permission. Status • Specification status – Adopted by OMG in May ’06 – Finalization Task Force Report in March ’07 – Available Specification v1.0 expected June ‘07 – Revision task force chartered for SysML v1.1 in March ‘07 • This tutorial is based on the OMG SysML adopted specification (ad-06-03-01) and changes proposed by the Finalization Task Force (ptc/07-03-03) • This tutorial, the specifications, papers, and vendor info can be found on the OMG SysML Website at http://www.omgsysml.org/ 7/26/2007 Copyright © 2006,2007 by Object Management Group. 2 Objectives & Intended Audience At the end of this tutorial, you should have an awareness of: • Benefits of model driven approaches for systems engineering • SysML diagrams and language concepts • How to apply SysML as part of a model based SE process • Basic considerations for transitioning to SysML This course is not intended to make you a systems modeler! You must use the language. Intended Audience: • Practicing Systems Engineers interested in system modeling • Software Engineers who want to better understand how to integrate software and system models • Familiarity with UML is not required, but it helps 7/26/2007 Copyright © 2006,2007 by Object Management Group. 3 Topics • Motivation & Background • Diagram Overview and Language Concepts • SysML Modeling as Part of SE Process – Structured Analysis – Distiller Example – OOSEM – Enhanced Security System Example • SysML in a Standards Framework • Transitioning to SysML • Summary 7/26/2007 Copyright © 2006,2007 by Object Management Group.
    [Show full text]
  • VI. the Unified Modeling Language UML Diagrams
    Conceptual Modeling CSC2507 VI. The Unified Modeling Language Use Case Diagrams Class Diagrams Attributes, Operations and ConstraintsConstraints Generalization and Aggregation Sequence and Collaboration Diagrams State and Activity Diagrams 2004 John Mylopoulos UML -- 1 Conceptual Modeling CSC2507 UML Diagrams I UML was conceived as a language for modeling software. Since this includes requirements, UML supports world modeling (...at least to some extend). I UML offers a variety of diagrammatic notations for modeling static and dynamic aspects of an application. I The list of notations includes use case diagrams, class diagrams, interaction diagrams -- describe sequences of events, package diagrams, activity diagrams, state diagrams, …more... 2004 John Mylopoulos UML -- 2 Conceptual Modeling CSC2507 Use Case Diagrams I A use case [Jacobson92] represents “typical use scenaria” for an object being modeled. I Modeling objects in terms of use cases is consistent with Cognitive Science theories which claim that every object has obvious suggestive uses (or affordances) because of its shape or other properties. For example, Glass is for looking through (...or breaking) Cardboard is for writing on... Radio buttons are for pushing or turning… Icons are for clicking… Door handles are for pulling, bars are for pushing… I Use cases offer a notation for building a coarse-grain, first sketch model of an object, or a process. 2004 John Mylopoulos UML -- 3 Conceptual Modeling CSC2507 Use Cases for a Meeting Scheduling System Initiator Participant
    [Show full text]
  • UML : Introduction
    UML : introduction Achref El Mouelhi Docteur de l’universite´ d’Aix-Marseille Chercheur en programmation par contrainte (IA) Ingenieur´ en genie´ logiciel [email protected] H & H: Research and Training 1 / 16 UML : introduction Achref El Mouelhi Docteur de l’universite´ d’Aix-Marseille Chercheur en programmation par contrainte (IA) Ingenieur´ en genie´ logiciel [email protected] H & H: Research and Training 2 / 16 UML © Achref EL MOUELHI © Pour construire cette maison Il faut etablir´ un plan avant H & H: Research and Training 3 / 16 UML La realisation´ d’une application peut passer par plusieurs etapes´ Definition´ des besoins Analyse Conception Developpement´ Test Validation© Achref EL MOUELHI © Deploiement´ Maintenance ... H & H: Research and Training 4 / 16 UML Ou` est UML dans tout c¸a ? UML permet de modeliser´ toutes les etapes´ du developpement´ d’une application de l’analyse au deploiement´ (en utilisant plusieurs diagrammes). © Achref EL MOUELHI © H & H: Research and Training 5 / 16 UML UML : Unified Modeling Language Un langage de modelisation´ unifie´ Ce n’est pas un langage de programmation Independant´ de tout langage de programmation (objet ou autre) Un langage base´ sur des notations graphiques Constitues´ de plusieurs graphes (diagrammes) permettant de visualiser© la Achref future application EL MOUELHI de plusieurs angles © differents´ Une norme maintenue par l’OMG (Object Management Group : organisation mondiale cre´ee´ en 1989 pour standardiser le modele` objet) H & H: Research and Training 6 / 16 Exemple
    [Show full text]
  • UML Tutorial: Part 1 -- Class Diagrams
    UML Tutorial: Part 1 -- Class Diagrams. Robert C. Martin My next several columns will be a running tutorial of UML. The 1.0 version of UML was released on the 13th of January, 1997. The 1.1 release should be out before the end of the year. This col- umn will track the progress of UML and present the issues that the three amigos (Grady Booch, Jim Rumbaugh, and Ivar Jacobson) are dealing with. Introduction UML stands for Unified Modeling Language. It represents a unification of the concepts and nota- tions presented by the three amigos in their respective books1. The goal is for UML to become a common language for creating models of object oriented computer software. In its current form UML is comprised of two major components: a Meta-model and a notation. In the future, some form of method or process may also be added to; or associated with, UML. The Meta-model UML is unique in that it has a standard data representation. This representation is called the meta- model. The meta-model is a description of UML in UML. It describes the objects, attributes, and relationships necessary to represent the concepts of UML within a software application. This provides CASE manufacturers with a standard and unambiguous way to represent UML models. Hopefully it will allow for easy transport of UML models between tools. It may also make it easier to write ancillary tools for browsing, summarizing, and modifying UML models. A deeper discussion of the metamodel is beyond the scope of this column. Interested readers can learn more about it by downloading the UML documents from the rational web site2.
    [Show full text]
  • Affordit!: a Tool for Authoring Object Component Behavior in Virtual
    AffordIt!: A Tool for Authoring Object Component Behavior in Virtual Reality * † ‡ § Sina Masnadi Andres´ N. Vargas Gonzalez´ Brian Williamson Joseph J. LaViola Jr. Department of Computer Science University of Central Florida (a) (b) (c) (d) Figure 1: These figures show a sequence of steps followed to add a rotation affordance to the door of a washer machine. (a) An object in the scenario (b) Cylinder shape selection wrapping the door. (c) A user sets the amount of rotation the door will be constrained to. (d) An animation generated from the affordance can be visualized. ABSTRACT realistic experiences necessary to a VR scene, but not asset creation In this paper we present AffordIt!, a tool for adding affordances (a situation described in Hughes et al. [17]) which are needed to to the component parts of a virtual object. Following 3D scene build a virtual scene. To alleviate this problem, recent research has been focusing on frameworks to ease users’ authoring process as reconstruction and segmentation procedures, users find themselves with complete virtual objects, but no intrinsic behaviors have been seen in [9, 12, 35]. 3D scene reconstruction [32, 34, 44, 49] provides assigned, forcing them to use unfamiliar Desktop-based 3D editing a suitable solution to the problem. Initially a 3D reconstructed tools. AffordIt! offers an intuitive solution that allows a user to environment will be composed of a continuous mesh which can be segmented via autonomous tools as shown in George et al. [10] and select a region of interest for the mesh cutter tool, assign an intrinsic behavior and view an animation preview of their work.
    [Show full text]
  • Unified Modeling Language 2.0 Part 1 - Introduction
    UML 2.0 – Tutorial (v4) 1 Unified Modeling Language 2.0 Part 1 - Introduction Prof. Dr. Harald Störrle Dr. Alexander Knapp University of Innsbruck University of Munich mgm technology partners (c) 2005-2006, Dr. H. Störrle, Dr. A. Knapp UML 2.0 – Tutorial (v4) 2 1 - Introduction History and Predecessors • The UML is the “lingua franca” of software engineering. • It subsumes, integrates and consolidates most predecessors. • Through the network effect, UML has a much broader spread and much better support (tools, books, trainings etc.) than other notations. • The transition from UML 1.x to UML 2.0 has – resolved a great number of issues; – introduced many new concepts and notations (often feebly defined); – overhauled and improved the internal structure completely. • While UML 2.0 still has many problems, current version (“the standard”) it is much better than what we ever had formal/05-07-04 of August ‘05 before. (c) 2005-2006, Dr. H. Störrle, Dr. A. Knapp UML 2.0 – Tutorial (v4) 3 1 - Introduction Usage Scenarios • UML has not been designed for specific, limited usages. • There is currently no consensus on the role of the UML: – Some see UML only as tool for sketching class diagrams representing Java programs. – Some believe that UML is “the prototype of the next generation of programming languages”. • UML is a really a system of languages (“notations”, “diagram types”) each of which may be used in a number of different situations. • UML is applicable for a multitude of purposes, during all phases of the software lifecycle, and for all sizes of systems - to varying degrees.
    [Show full text]