Language Concepts

Model Elements

There are different types of language elements for describing ADORA domain models. There is the distinction between  nodes, which describe specific entities in a model, and connections, which denote the relationships between the nodes.

ADORA Specification

Nodes

Abstract Object

Abstract objects represent single prototypical instances that are constituents of a system or another object. (Objects are denoted as rectangled shape with their name either in the center or in the left upper corner. An object A can consist of a behavior description and other objects that are part of the object A. For example, figure 1 shows object A containing the objects B, C and D as parts. More formally, B, C and D have an is-part-of relationship with A.

Figure showing an object containing three objcts as a part.

Figure 1: Figure which shows an object A which contains three objects B, C and D.

Abstract objects can be embedded in an ADORA specification or in another abstract object. Abstract objects can have a detailed description of the attributes, datatypes and operations that are provided by the object. Such a description is made by using the functional specification language described later on.

Object Set

Object sets are sets of abstract objects, i.e. denote extensions of abstract objects. An object set is denoted by a stack of objects. Such a stack shows the minimal and maximal number of instances in the extension in the left lower corner by a number pair surrounded by a pair of parentheses. Fig. 2 shows the same situation as in Fig. 1 but with the A as an object set. This means that there is at least 1 instance of A and not more than n instances of A.

Simple object set

Figure 2:
The same situation as in Figure 2 as object set with at least one instance of A and not more than n instances.

Objects in an object set denote initially the same type of objects, i.e. initialized with the same attribute values but which can reach a different state during runtime. An object set can provide special functions that allow to retrieve objects or sub sets of the object set by querying against one or several attributes of the extension's objects (see the functional specification language for object sets). Each object within the set can be addressed directly by sending a message to it. It is also possible to broadcast a message to all objects in the set or to some of them (multicast). How this is done can be found in the description of how transitions are described and the description of associations.

- carthesian product
- adressing

State

- placed in objects or object sets
- decribing the state of

Scenario

- Internal behavior
- System border crossing
-

Actor


Aspect Container


Exit Point


Connections


Association


Transition


Scenario Connection


Join Relationship


Functional Specification Language (FSL) Syntax

Abstract Object Body and Object Sets


Aspect Containers


Scenario Transformation Syntax


Transition Description Syntax