Software and Systems Modeling 

About: Software and Systems Modeling is an academic journal published by Springer Science+Business Media. The journal publishes majorly in the area(s): Computer science & Unified Modeling Language. It has an ISSN identifier of 1619-1366. Over the lifetime, 1084 publications have been published receiving 29587 citations. The journal is also known as: SoSyM.

On the unification power of models

Abstract: In November 2000, the OMG made public the MDA™initiative, a particular variant of a new global trend called MDE (Model Driven Engineering). The basic ideas of MDA are germane to many other approaches such as generative programming, domain specific languages, model-integrated computing, generic model management, software factories, etc. MDA may be defined as the realization of MDE principles around a set of OMG standards like MOF, XMI, OCL, UML, CWM, SPEM, etc. MDE is presently making several promises about the potential benefits that could be reaped from a move from code-centric to model-based practices. When we observe these claims, we may wonder when they may be satisfied: on the short, medium or long term or even never perhaps for some of them. This paper tries to propose a vision of the development of MDE based on some lessons learnt in the past 30 years in the development of object technology. The main message is that a basic principle ("Everything is an object") was most helpful in driving the technology in the direction of simplicity, generality and power of integration. Similarly in MDE, the basic principle that "Everything is a model" has many interesting properties, among others the capacity to generate a realistic research agenda. We postulate here that two core relations (representation and conformance) are associated to this principle, as inheritance and instantiation were associated to the object unification principle in the class-based languages of the 80's. We suggest that this may be most useful in understanding many questions about MDE in general and the MDA approach in particular. We provide some illustrative examples. The personal position taken in this paper would be useful if it could generate a critical debate on the research directions in MDE.

Matters of (Meta-) Modeling

Abstract: With the recent trend to model driven engineering a common understanding of basic notions such as “model” and “metamodel” becomes a pivotal issue. Even though these notions have been in widespread use for quite a while, there is still little consensus about when exactly it is appropriate to use them. The aim of this article is to start establishing a consensus about generally acceptable terminology. Its main contributions are the distinction between two fundamentally different kinds of model roles, i.e. “token model” versus “type model” (The terms “type” and “token” have been introduced by C.S. Peirce, 1839–1914.), a formal notion of “metaness”, and the consideration of “generalization” as yet another basic relationship between models. In particular, the recognition of the fundamental difference between the above mentioned two kinds of model roles is crucial in order to enable communication among the model driven engineering community that is free of both unnoticed misunderstandings and unnecessary disagreement.

A UML-Based Approach to System Testing

Abstract: System testing is concerned with testing an entire system based on its specifications. In the context of object-oriented, UML development, this means that system test requirements are derived from UML analysis artifacts such as use cases, their corresponding sequence and collaboration diagrams, class diagrams, and possibly Object Constraint Language (OCL) expressions across all these artifacts. Our goal here is to support the derivation of functional system test requirements, which will be transformed into test cases, test oracles, and test drivers once we have detailed design information. In this paper, we describe a methodology in a practical way and illustrate it with an example. In this context, we address testability and automation issues, as the ultimate goal is to fully support system testing activities with high-capability tools.

Process mining : a two-step approach to balance between underfitting and overfitting

Abstract: Process mining includes the automated discovery of processes from event logs. Based on observed events (e.g., activities being executed or messages being exchanged) a process model is constructed. One of the essential problems in process mining is that one cannot assume to have seen all possible behavior. At best, one has seen a representative subset. Therefore, classical synthesis techniques are not suitable as they aim at finding a model that is able to exactly reproduce the log. Existing process mining techniques try to avoid such “overfitting” by generalizing the model to allow for more behavior. This generalization is often driven by the representation language and very crude assumptions about completeness. As a result, parts of the model are “overfitting” (allow only for what has actually been observed) while other parts may be “underfitting” (allow for much more behavior without strong support for it). None of the existing techniques enables the user to control the balance between “overfitting” and “underfitting”. To address this, we propose a two-step approach. First, using a configurable approach, a transition system is constructed. Then, using the “theory of regions”, the model is synthesized. The approach has been implemented in the context of ProM and overcomes many of the limitations of traditional approaches.

Testing Web applications by modeling with FSMs

Abstract: Researchers and practitioners are still trying to find effective ways to model and test Web applications This paper proposes a system-level testing technique that combines test generation based on finite state machines with constraints We use a hierarchical approach to model potentially large Web applications The approach builds hierarchies of Finite State Machines (FSMs) that model subsystems of the Web applications, and then generates test requirements as subsequences of states in the FSMs These subsequences are then combined and refined to form complete executable tests The constraints are used to select a reduced set of inputs with the goal of reducing the state space explosion otherwise inherent in using FSMs The paper illustrates the technique with a running example of a Web-based course student information system and introduces a prototype implementation to support the technique