Section 10.3.7, Device (from Nodes), in the UML 2.2 specification contains the following deployment diagram (see page 206).

Figure 1 – Notation for a Device

Clearly, all the nodes in this diagram are instances. With this in mind, let’s try and recreate a similar diagram using Rational Software Architect 7.5.

Creating the AppServer and J2EEServer elements is pretty straightforward. A graphical representation of the model looks something like the following. In the example below I’ve added some attributes to the AppServer device to highlight the fact it’s an element specification, not an instance.

Figure 2 – Deployment Model

If you selected the "Blank Deployment Package" template and default model capabilities in the model creation wizard, the ability to add node instances will be disabled. To remedy this you need to select the capabilities tab in the model properties panel and select the "UML Specific Instance Type 1" and "UML Specific Instance Type 2" options.

Figure 3 – Enabling Node Instances

Once this is done you can starting adding node instances to your deployment diagram. For example.

Figure 4 – Deployment Diagram

The problems arise when you try and add nested nodes to the diagram because, basically, you can’t. As the following figure shows, the properties panel appearance tab options for showing textual and/or graphical nested node compartments are absent for node instances.

Figure 5 – Node Instance Properties

Unfortunately, the help documentation is totally unhelpful as it contains the following section

Nesting nodes inside other nodes

In UML modelling, you can nest nodes within nodes to represent the hardware and software components in a system that contains other components.

A diagram must be open in the diagram editor, and the diagram must contain at least two nodes. The Nested Nodes compartment of the container node must be visible.

To nest a node in another node, in the diagram editor, click one node and drag it into the Nested Node compartment of another node.

As the following figure illustrates, a node named Node2 is displayed in the Nested Nodes Textual and Nested Nodes Graphical compartments of another node, named Node1.

Figure 6 – Rational Software Architect Help

What they fail to mention is that none of this applies to node instances. I raised this with Rational Support and after a month’s deliberation they finally confirmed that nested node instances are not currently supported.

Over the past few weeks I’ve been evaluating IBM’s Rational Software Architect (RSA) for WebSphere 7.5 . Whilst RSA is an incredibly powerful piece of software, there are a number of features that are conspicuous by their absence. Perhaps the most prominent of these is the inability of the Java to UML transformation to generate relationships other than Generalisation or Realisation. For example, it won’t generate Association or Usage elements. This makes it pretty useless when it comes to visualising the structure of existing code

You could argue that RSA’s raison d’etre is not the reverse engineering of UML models from Java code, but rather the architecture and development of new applications. This is true, but it misses the point as a number of RSA’s design contract management protocols (notably, "Reconciled Modelling" and "Conceptual Models Drive Development") rely on the reverse transformation of Java code.

According to Rational Support this issue has been logged as a request for enhancement, but when or if it makes it into a future release is anyone’s guess. In the meantime here’s an illustration of the problem.

Step 1 – Create a simple UML model with a composite aggregation navigable from both ends

Figure 1. Class diagram view

Figure 2. Project explorer view

Step 2 – Run a reconciled UML to Java transformation on the model

This produces the following java classes (minus the auto-generated comments):

Whole.java

package uml;

import java.util.Set;

public class Whole {

	private Set part;
}

Part.java

package uml;

public class Part {

	private Whole whole;
}

Step 3 – Comment out both private fields in the generated source and run the reverse transformation

As you’d expect, the composite aggregation relationship has now been deleted from the model.

Figure 3. Class diagram view

Figure 4. Project explorer view

Step 4 – Uncomment both fields and rerun the reverse transformation

Unfortunately this doesn’t produce the results you’d expect. Rather than explicitly creating an Association element in the UML model, the composite aggregation becomes implicit via the generated attributes for each class. By itself this isn’t a major drama, but it does introduce an inconsistency in your model if you have existing relationships that are modelled explicitly, as was originally the case. To visualise the recreated association you have to filter the attributes to "show as association". However, this only produces uni-directional associations which results in difficult to read diagrams full of unnecessary clutter and noise. The only workaround is to manually recreate the association in the model, which at best wastes time and at worst introduces errors.

Figure 4. Class diagram view (show as attribute)

Figure 4. Class diagram view (show as association)

Figure 5. Project explorer view

 Grubumuz; Teşkilat-ı Esasiye olarak IBM Türkiye’nin düzenlemiş olduğu, Yazılım Akademisi’ni geride bıraktık… Allah’a şükürler olsun ki, bu proje süresince bizde birşeyler yapabildik ve büyük oranda tamamlamış olduğumuz projemizi dün itibari ile IBM’e gönderdik…

Oi pessoal.

Estou postando hoje o material que foi apresentado para a FIO-Faculdades Integradas de Ourinhos, em sua visita a IBM no dia 14/09/2007. Todo o conteúdo é muito interessante. Seguem os arquivos:

- SOA (Service Oriented Architecture)e padrões XML – Material sobre a palestra do Damico, pode ser encontrado aqui (OBS: Até agora (12:12 AM 16/09), o Damico ainda não postou).

- RSA (Rational Software Architect)- Tutorial sobre modelagem de uma aplicação em UML e exportação para Java, ministrada pelo Alexandre. Aqui.

- JSF (Java Server Faces)- Material apresentado pelo Ernani mostrando a construção de uma app com JSF, Hibernate e Spring. A apresentação está aqui, este é o link para a página que o Ernani indicou e finalmente este é o exemplo que foi apresentado no Eclipse (link novo, agora funciona).

Os arquivos estão compactados em .rar.

Eu gostaria tambem de passar um link muito interessante sobre RSA no developerworks: www.ibm.com/developerworks/edu/i-dw-r-rsavisual.html, ele mostra praticamente o mesmo que é apresentado no PPT do Alexandre, porém, com algumas informações complementares.

Como sempre, usem e abusem do Developer Works: www.ibm.com/developerworks.

Isso é tudo. Enjoy!!!

Abraços,

Juliano