General-purpose Modeling Language Research Articles

Assessing the specification of modelling language semantics: a study on UML PSSM

Modelling languages play a central role in developing complex, critical systems. A precise, comprehensible, and high-quality modelling language specification is essential to all stakeholders using, implementing, or extending the language. Many good practices can be found that improve the understandability or consistency of the languages’ semantics. However, designing a modelling language intended for a large audience is still challenging. In this paper, we investigate the challenges and typical issues with assessing the specifications of behavioural modelling language semantics. Our key insight is that the various stakeholder’s understandings of the language’s semantics are often misaligned, and the semantics defined in various artefacts (simulators, test suites) are inconsistent. Therefore assessment of semantics should focus on identifying and resolving these inconsistencies. To illustrate these challenges and techniques, we assessed parts of a state-of-the-art specification for a general-purpose modelling language, the Precise Semantics of UML State Machines (PSSM). We reviewed the text of the specification, analysed and executed PSSM’s conformance test suite, and categorised our experiences according to questions generally relevant to modelling languages. Finally, we made recommendations for improving the development of future modelling languages by representing the semantic domain and traces more explicitly, applying diverse test design techniques to obtain conformance test suites, and using various tools to support early-phase language design.

Towards the Modelling of European Railway System Architecture

To master the increasing complexity of railway system, many European railway architecture initiatives are moving towards the application of Model Based System Engineering (MBSE) at overall railway system level or subsystems levels. Most of these initiatives apply the MBSE in their specific scopes. There is no common or unified MBSE methodology and related domain modelling language. Railway domain experts are usually not familiar with general-purpose modelling languages such as UML/SysML and need to collaborate with modelling experts to construct the future digital model of European railway system reference architecture. This paper presents a MBSE methodology and unified modelling language for the railway domain. The methodology is developed in LinX4Rail project, and the domain specific modelling language is used to model the preliminary description of LinX4Rail Architecture.

Using a case model at a stand software designing for training skills in working with modern switching arrangement

The article is devoted to the design of an information system for testing skills in working with modern switching arrangement on a laboratory bench based on the general-purpose visual modeling language UML. Precedents at the interaction of the system with the user (for example, a student) are described. A precedent diagram for the Panasonic NCP500 IP-PBX stand is carried out. Two scenarios for study by students the elements of an automatic telephone exchange is developed. The creation of interaction diagrams, illustrating the connection of objects in the process of fulfilling system requirements is considered. The structure of the developed software, reflecting its functionality, is formed. Keywords software means, information system, precedent, scenario, system operation, application, automatic telephone exchange, laboratory stand

Combining PDEVS and Modelica for describing agent-based models

Modelica is a general-purpose modeling language mainly designed to facilitate the development, reusability and exchange of models. It represents the state-of-the-art in equation-based modeling of continuous-time systems. Modelica libraries facilitate the description of multi-formalism and multi-domain models. However, the description of agent-based models (ABMs) in Modelica is not currently supported, mainly due to the characteristics of the language and its simulation algorithm. The combination of ABMs with continuous-time equations provides a powerful tool for describing and analyzing complex systems. An approach for describing ABMs using the Modelica language is presented in this manuscript, with the objective of facilitating the combination of ABMs with the rest of Modelica functionality. Agent behavior is described using a process-oriented modeling approach. Agents are described as individual entities that move across a flowchart diagram, that represents the processes that agents undergo. Processes are formally described using the Parallel DEVS formalism, extended to describe the interface with other Modelica models. The environment where agents interact is described as a cellular automaton. This approach has been implemented in a free Modelica library, named ABMLib. Three case studies are discussed to illustrate the modeling functionality of the library and its combination with other models: a basic traffic model, a sheep–wolves predator–prey model and a consumer market model.

Electronic representations of conceptual models for simulation – A scoping review

ABSTRACT Simulation facilitates the understanding and improvement of complex systems. Conceptual modelling is a key step in simulation studies. It has gained recognition because it may both increase engagement with stakeholders and decrease the time to implement a simulation. This scoping review’s objective is to highlight approaches and platforms for electronically representing models from 1999 to 2020. The motivation is that electronic representations facilitate the sharing of conceptual models. The contribution from the review to the research of conceptual modelling and simulation is to show that conceptual models are electronically represented by broadly speaking either General-Purpose or Domain-Specific Modelling Languages. There is a slight trend towards the latter in order to better deal with application specificities and improve unambiguity in model representations, though. Thus, we identify modelling approaches, platforms, and features for electronically representing conceptual models with the potential to fill the gap between conceptual models and their corresponding simulation implementations.

Multi-level modeling: cornerstones of a rationale

This expert voice paper presents a comprehensive rationale of multi-level modeling. It aims not only at a systematic assessment of its prospects, but also at encouraging applications of multi-level modeling in business information systems and at providing a motivation for future research. The assessment is developed from a comparison of multi-level modeling with object-oriented, general-purpose modeling languages (GPMLs) and domain-specific modeling languages (DSMLs). To foster a differentiated evaluation, we propose a multi-perspective framework that accounts, among others, for essential design conflicts, different types of users, as well as economic aspects. Besides the assessment of the additional abstraction offered by multi-level modeling, the evaluation also identifies specific drawbacks and remaining challenges. Based on the results of the comparative assessment, in order to foster the adoption and further development of multi-level modeling, we discuss the prospects of supplementing multi-level modeling languages with multi-level programming languages and suggest possible dissemination strategies customized for different groups of users. The paper concludes with an outline of future research.

Verifying the Correctness of UML Statechart Outpatient Clinic Based on Common Modeling Language and SMV

Unified-modelling language (UML) is a standard general purpose modelling language, which is widely, used in system design of banking, biological, plantation and healthcare. Recently, there are many systems of healthcare are modeled using behavioral diagram such as UML statechart for design purposes. However, the behavior of healthcare statechart is rarely verified to ensure it is behaving as we needed. In software engineering, a software should be verified before it is transform to the further phases. In this paper, a statechart of outpatient clinic is verified to ensuring the correctness of its design. Therefore, to achieve our objective, we have applied Common Modeling Language (CML) and SMV model checker for verification formal system modeling and specification of property of statechart outpatient clinic. The result shows that the statechart of outpatient clinic is behave as required and the statechart is allowable to transform to the next phase.

Язык моделирования гетерогенных динамических систем LISMA_HDS

Heterogeneous dynamic systems (HDS) simultaneously describe processes of different physical nature. Systems of this kind are typical for numerous applications. HDSs are characterized by the following features. They are often multimode or hybrid systems. In general, their modes are defined as initial value problems (Cauchy problems) for implicit differential-algebraic systems of equations. Due to the presence of heterogeneous dynamic components or processes evolving in both time and space, the dimension of the complete system of equations may be pretty high. In some cases, the system of equations has an internal structure, for instance, the differential-algebraic system of equations approximating a partial differential equation by the method of lines. An original huge system of equations can then be algorithmically rewritten in a compact form. Moreover, heterogeneous hybrid dynamical systems can generate events of qualitatively different types. Therefore one has to use different numerical event detection algorithms. Nowadays, HDSs are modeled and simulated in computer environments. The modeling languages widely used by engineers do not allow them to fully specify all the properties of the systems of this class. For instance, they do not include event typing constructs. That is why a declarative general-purpose modeling language named LISMA_HDS has been developed for the computer-aided modeling and ISMA simulation environment. The language takes into account all of the characteristic features of HDSs. It includes constructs for plain or algorithmic declaration of model constants, initial value problems for explicit differential-algebraic systems of equations, and initial guesses for variables. It also allows researchers to define explicit time events, modes and transitions between them upon the occurrence of events of different types, to use macros and implement event control. LISMA_HDS is defined by a generative grammar in an extended Backus-Naur form and semantic constraints. It is proved that the grammar belongs to the LL(2) subclass of context-free grammars.

Synthesis-Based Engineering of Supervisory Controllers for Autonomous Robotic Navigation

When mobile robots are employed in transportation tasks involving contact with humans, their control software shall guarantee that in every possible circumstance safety and, in general, task requirements are guaranteed. When control models are manually translated into an executable implementation, it becomes cumbersome to provide such guarantees. Model-driven engineering approaches provide an answer to such a problem. Domain specific models are automatically translated into an executable implementation. Some model-driven engineering approaches exist that are specific to robotics. However, formal guarantees on correctness of the model and the generated implementation with respect to the requirements are, often, not provided. This paper investigates how a general purpose modelling language for supervisory controller synthesis can be used to formally model plants and requirements for a robotic navigation task and can generate an executable implementation that can be integrated into a leading middleware for robotic applications. The starting point is the modelling of the interface provided by existing navigation components available in the targeted middleware. We demonstrate, with simulations and real-life experiments, that the generated supervisory controller is suitable for real-time deployment and guarantees correctness of the model with respect to the requirements of the navigation task at hand. Results on the reaction time of the supervisory controller show that such reaction time is about twenty times smaller than the one of the same supervisory controller implemented with a conventional framework.

Overview of Design and Implementation of Library Circulation Model : A Case of Lagos State University Library

The beauty of Library operations is not only in the ability to provide needed and useful materials containing information for the community, but also to be able to make them accessible to the clientele as and when needed, which is what circulation is all about. The objectives of the study were, to analyse the existing information system in LASU Library circulation section, design an information model for circulation section of LASU Library, and implementation of the designed library circulation model. The implementation tools used were, HTML (the Hypertext Mark-up Language), CSS (Cascading Style Sheets), Java Script, Jquery, and Mongodb. . The architectural design used was the unified modelling language (UML) which is a general-purpose modelling language in the field of software engineering and provide a standard way to visualize the design of a system. The model will increase the effectiveness and efficiency of the activities carried out at the circulation unit of LASU Library. At the end of the study, recommendations are provided for the smooth run of the designed circulation model.

Specification and simulation of material science problems in ISMA

The model types supported by a modeling and simulation environment called ISMA are presented. A fragment of the grammar of the general-purpose modeling language LISMA used in ISMA is given. A typical material science and engineering problem, namely modeling and simulation of the heat transfer within a beam, is solved using ISMA. A grammar for specifying chemical kinetics problems is briefly presented in order to demonstrate how the developed mathematical software suite can be extended to a new domain.

Design and Implementation of Library Circulation Model of Lagos State University Library

The beauty of Library operations is not only in the ability to provide needed and useful materials containing information for the community, but also to be able to make them accessible to the clientele as and when needed, which is what circulation is all about. The objectives of the study are, to analyse the existing information system in LASU Library circulation section, design an information model for circulation section of LASU Library, and implementation of the designed library circulation model. The implementation tools used are, HTML (the Hypertext Mark-up Language), CSS (Cascading Style Sheets), Java Script, Jquery, and Mongodb. . The architectural design used is the unified modelling language (UML) which is a general-purpose modelling language in the field of software engineering and provide a standard way to visualize the design of a system. The model will increase the effectiveness and efficiency of the activities carried out at the circulation unit of LASU Library. At the end of the study, recommendations are provided for the smooth run of the designed circulation model.

Diagnosis Analysis of Modelica Models

To leverage on model based engineering for fault diagnosis, it is useful to be able to do direct analysis of general purpose modelling languages for engineering systems. In this work, it is demonstrated how non-trivial Modelica models, for example utilizing the Modelica standard library, can be automatically transformed into a format where existing fault diagnosis analysis techniques are applicable. The procedure is demonstrated on a model of an air cooling system in the Gripen fighter aircraft developed by Saab, Sweden. It is discussed why the Modelica language is well suited for diagnosability analysis, and a number of non-trivial diagnosability analysis shows the efficacy of the approach. The methods extract the model structure, which gives additional insight into the system, e.g., highlighting model connections and possible model decompositions.

An approach to agent-based modeling with Modelica

Modelica is a free, general-purpose object-oriented equation-based modeling language. It is mainly designed to describe systems using the physical modeling approach. Our proposal to describe Agent-Based Models (ABMs) in Modelica is discussed in this manuscript. The contribution of the presented work is twofold: firstly, to analyze the conceptual requirements to describe ABMs in Modelica; and secondly, to develop a prototype implementation following the previous analysis. Agents are described using a message passing communication mechanism previously proposed by the authors. Additional extensions to this mechanism are proposed in order to describe agent interactions. The environment, where the agents live, is described as a two-dimensional cellular automaton. A new Modelica library, named ABMLib, developed to support this functionality, is presented. A prototype implementation of the message passing mechanism and ABMLib models has been performed to demonstrate the functionality of the library as a proof-of-concept for this proposal. The library is freely available at www.euclides.dia.uned.es/vsanz.

A Systematic Literature Review of iStar extensions

iStar is a general-purpose goal-based modelling language used to model requirements at early and late phases of software development. It has been used in industrial and academic projects. Often the language is extended to incorporate new constructs related to an application area. The language is currently undergoing standardisation, so several studies have focused on the analysis of iStar variations to identify the similarities and defining a core iStar. However, we believe it will continue to be extended and it is important to understand how iStar is extended. This paper contributes to this purpose through the identification and analysis of the existing extensions and its constructs. A Systematic Literature Review was conducted to guide identification and analysis. The results point to 96 papers and 307 constructs proposed. The extensions and constructs were analysed according to well-defined questions in three dimensions: a general analysis; model-based analysis (to characterise the extensions from semantic and syntactic definitions); and a third dimension related to semiotic clarity. The application area targeted by the iStar extensions and their evolutions are presented as results of our analysis. The results point to the need for more complete, consistent and careful development of iStar extensions. The paper concludes with some discussions and future directions for this research field.

Model of Mobile Manipulator Performance Measurement using SysML.

Test methods for measuring safety and performance of mobile manipulators have yet to be developed. Therefore, potential mobile manipulator users cannot compare one system to another. Systems Modeling Language (SysML) is a general-purpose modeling language for systems engineering applications that supports the specification, analysis, design, verification, and validation of simple through complex systems, such as mobile manipulators. As test methods are developed to allow performance comparison of the varied mobile manipulators, so to should be the case of allowing comparison of most any mobile manipulator configuration and control strategy during performance measurements. Additionally, mobile manipulator manufacturers and users can then compare these systems to tasks using various methods. This paper uses SysML to describe two measurement methods (optical tracking and artifacts) and the performance measurement of mobile manipulators performing assembly tasks. The SysML models are verified through systems review, referenced experimentation and summarize with uncertainty propagation models of the mobile manipulator.

User Assistance Characteristics of the USE Model Checking Tool

The Unified Modeling Language (UML) is a widely used general purpose modeling language. Together with the Object Constraint Language (OCL), formal models can be described by defining the structure and behavior with UML and additional OCL constraints. In the development process for formal models, it is important to make sure that these models are (a) correct, i.e. consistent and complete, and (b) testable in the sense that the developer is able to interactively check model properties. The USE tool (UML-based Specification Environment) allows both characteristics to be studied. We demonstrate how the tool supports modelers to analyze, validate and verify UML and OCL models via the use of several graphical means that assist the modeler in interpreting and visualizing formal model descriptions. In particular, we discuss how the so-called USE model validator plugin is integrated into the USE environment in order to allow non domain experts to use it and construct object models that help to verify properties like model consistency.

Using design languages in model-based mechatronic system design processes

Since modern production processes are multi-disciplinary, all relevant disciplines must be involved in product development in order to achieve good results. While established programs for design and simulation are successfully applied in preliminary and detail design, software support in the earlier design phases is poor. We summarise a variety of modelling approaches and analyse the application of general purpose modelling and model-based description languages within a step-wise iterative process model based on VDI-Guideline 2221 in the individual design phases. Our analysis is supported by an example application to the design of a bottling plant. We conclude that General Purpose Modelling and Model-Based Design Languages are useful methods for early product design and could facilitate multi-disciplinary modelling and simulation in a future product development process by thorough integration of different model views in a system model.

Managing dependencies in mechatronic design: a case study on dependency management between mechanical design and system design

In this paper, we have investigated the role of dependencies in the design process of mechatronic products. Since explicit modeling of dependencies is largely considered unnecessary today, current languages do not support dependency modeling due to lack of sufficiently expressive language constructs. However, this paper argues that modeling dependencies is important in managing the overall design process. The paper highlights dependencies between two important viewpoints: system design and mechanical design. We have looked closely at how mechanical design (supported by CAD tools) establishes a backbone for the overall design concept. Mechanical design cannot be isolated from other design activities, and the mismanagement of dependencies there leads to problems in other domains too. To illustrate the process, the paper presents an example of modeling dependencies between system hierarchy in OMG SysML™ and the CAD assembly in Solid Edge for a mechatronic design example. The paper presents two different approaches to capturing dependencies--using a general purpose modeling language such as SysML and using a domain specific modeling language (DSML). We argue for using a DSML instead of a general purpose language and provide a DSML called the dependency modeling language (DML). An example DML model for a two degree of freedom robot use case is discussed. The paper also illustrates the complete process of capturing dependencies in a general purpose modeling language like SysML, which served as a good exercise on how to fetch data from a CAD tool and how to represent dependencies inside a significantly different modeling language. Lessons learned from doing this were applied to the construction of DML. Our aim for the future is to reduce the human effort required to build dependency models. Machine learning techniques and automated model transformations are valuable techniques to support this cause.

A Qualitative Study of Domain Specific Languages for Model Driven Security

In Model-Driven development, software system design is represented through models which are created using general purpose modeling languages e.g., UML. Later on system artifacts are automatically generated from these models. Model-Driven Security is a specialization of Model-Driven paradigm towards the domain of security, where security objectives are modeled along the system models and security infrastructures are directly generated from these models. Currently available general purpose modeling languages like UML do not have capability to model the security objectives along the system models. Over the past decade, many researchers are trying to address these limitations of the general purpose modeling languages and come up with several Domain Specific Modeling Languages for Model Driven Security. In this study, a comparative study is presented regarding the security Domain Specific Modeling Languages presented by the most prominent researchers for the development of secure system. A success criteria has been defined and these DSLs are critically analyzed based on it to obtain the qualitative results.