Mapping Architectural Concepts to UML-RT

摘要

Complex software systems require expressive notations for representing their software architectures. Two competing paths have emerged, one using a specialized notation for architecture―or architecture description language (ADL), the other using notations applied generally throughout design, such as UML. The latter benefits from familiarity to developers, close mapping to implementation, and commercial tool support. However, it remains an open question how best to use object-oriented notations for architectural description and whether they are sufficiently expressive as currently defined. In this paper, we present a mapping between an ADL―Acme―and an object-oriented design notation―the UML Real-Time Profile. Specifically, we describe (a) how to map Acme descriptions to descriptions in the UML Real Time Profile, and (b) the places where this mapping breaks down.