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On the Impact of Layout Quality to Understanding UML Diagrams: Size Matters

  • Conference paper
Model-Driven Engineering Languages and Systems (MODELS 2014)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNPSE,volume 8767))

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Abstract

Practical experience suggests that usage and understanding of UML diagrams is greatly affected by the quality of their layout. While existing research failed to provide conclusive evidence in support of this hypothesis, our own previous work provided substantial evidence to this effect. When studying different factors like diagram type and expertise level, it became apparent that diagram size plays an important role, too. Since we lack an adequate understanding of this notion, in this paper, we define diagram size metrics and study their impact to modeler performance. We find that there is a strong negative correlation between diagram size and modeler performance. Our results are highly significant. We utilize these results to derive a recommendation on diagram sizes that are optimal for model understanding.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Applied Mathematics and Computer Science, Technical University of Denmark, Matematiktorvet, 2800, Kongens Lyngby, Denmark

    Harald Störrle

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  1. Harald Störrle
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Queen’s University, Kingston, ON, Canada

    Juergen Dingel

  2. Microsoft Research, Redmond, WA, USA

    Wolfram Schulte

  3. Universitat Politècnica de València, Spain

    Isidro Ramos , Silvia Abrahão  & Emilio Insfran ,  & 

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Störrle, H. (2014). On the Impact of Layout Quality to Understanding UML Diagrams: Size Matters. In: Dingel, J., Schulte, W., Ramos, I., Abrahão, S., Insfran, E. (eds) Model-Driven Engineering Languages and Systems. MODELS 2014. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 8767. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-11653-2_32

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-11653-2_32

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-11652-5

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-11653-2

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