Abstract
UML activity diagrams are a commonly used notation for modelling business processes in the field of both workflow automation and requirements engineering. In this paper, we present a novel precise style for this notation. Further, the effectiveness of this style has been investigated in the context of the modelling of business processes through a controlled experiment conducted with master students in Computer Science at the Free University of Bolzano-Bozen. The results indicate that the subjects achieved a significantly better comprehension level when business processes are modelled using the precise style with respect to a “lighter” variant, with no significant impact on the effort to accomplish the tasks.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
Aversano, L., De Lucia, A., Gaeta, M., Ritrovato, P., Stefanucci, S., Villani, M.L.: Managing coordination and cooperation in distributed software processes: the genesis environment. Software Process: Improvement and Practice 9(4), 239–263 (2004)
Bandinelli, S., Di Nitto, E., Fuggetta, A.: Supporting cooperation in the spade-1 environment. IEEE Trans. Softw. Eng. 22, 841–865 (1996)
Basili, V., Shull, F., Lanubile, F.: Building knowledge through families of experiments. IEEE Trans. Softw. Eng. 25(4), 456–473 (1999)
Coman, I.D., Sillitti, A.: An empirical exporatory study on inferring developpers’ activities from low-level data. In: Proceedings of International Conference on Software Engineering and Knowledge, pp. 15–18. Knowledge Systems Institute Graduate School (2007)
Cugola, G., Di Nitto, E., Fuggetta, A.: The jedi event-based infrastructure and its application to the development of the opss wfms. IEEE Trans. Softw. Eng. 27, 827–850 (2001)
De Lucia, A., Francese, R., Scanniello, G., Tortora, G.: Distributed workflow management based on UML and web services. In: Encyclopedia of E-Commerce, E-Government, and Mobile Commerce, pp. 217–222. IGI Global (2006)
De Lucia, A., Francese, R., Tortora, G.: Deriving workflow enactment rules from uml activity diagrams: a case study. In: Symposium on Human-Centric Computing Languages and Environments, pp. 211–218 (2003)
Eriksson, H.E., Penker, M.: Business Modelling with UML. Wiley Computing Publishing, Chichester (2000)
Gonzalez, J.D., Diaz, J.S.: Business process-driven requirements engineering: a goal-based approach. In: Proc. of the 8th Workshop on Business Process Modeling Development and Support, pp. 1–9. Tapir Academic Press, London (2007)
Gross, A., Doerr, J.: EPC vs. UML activity diagram - two experiments examining their usefulness for requirements engineering. In: Proceedings of Requirements Engineering Conference, pp. 47–56. IEEE Computer Society, Washington, DC, USA (2009)
Heimann, P., Joeris, G., Krapp, C., Westfechtel, B.: Dynamite: Dynamic task nets for software process management. In: Proceedings of the International Conference on Software Engineering, pp. 331–341 (1996)
Jurack, S., Lambers, L., Mehner, K., Taentzer, G., Wierse, G.: Object flow definition for refined activity diagrams. In: Proceedings of the 12th International Conference on Fundamental Approaches to Software Engineering, pp. 49–63. Springer, Heidelberg (2009)
Juristo, N., Moreno, A.: Basics of Software Engineering Experimentation. Kluwer Academic Publishers, Dordrecht (2001)
Marshall, C.: Enterprise modelling with UML: Designing successful software through business analysis. Addison-Wesley, Reading (2000)
Monfared, R., West, A., Harrison, R., Weston, R.: An implementation of the business process modelling approach in the automotive industry. Journal of Engineering Manufacture 216(11), 1413–1428 (2002)
Nitto, E.D., Lavazza, L., Schiavoni, M., Tracanella, E., Trombetta, M.: Deriving executable process descriptions from UML. In: Proceedings of the 22rd International Conference on Software Engineering, pp. 155–165 (2002)
Business, O.: process model and notation (BPMN) Version 2.0. OMG Final Adopted Specification, Object Management Group (2006)
OMG. Object constraint language (OCL) specification, version 2.2. Technical report, Object Management Group (February 2010)
OMG. Unified modeling language (UML) specification, version 2.3. Technical report, Object Management Group (May 2010)
Peixoto, D., Batista, V., Atayde, A., Borges, E., Resende, R., Pádua, C.: A Comparison of BPMN and UML 2.0 Activity Diagrams. In: VII Simposio Brasileiro de Qualidade de Software (2008)
Ricca, F., Di Penta, M., Torchiano, M., Tonella, P., Ceccato, M.: The role of experience and ability in comprehension tasks supported by uml stereotypes. In: 29th International Conference on Software Engineering (ICSE 2007), Minneapolis, MN, USA, 2007, May 20-26, pp. 375–384 (2007)
Scheer, A.: ARIS-business process modeling. Springer, Heidelberg (2000)
Torchiano, M., Ricca, F., Tonella, P.: Empirical comparison of graphical and annotation-based re-documentation approaches. IET Software 4(1), 15–31 (2010)
Wohlin, C., Runeson, P., Höst, M., Ohlsson, M., Regnell, B., Wesslén, A.: Experimentation in Software Engineering - An Introduction. Kluwer, Dordrecht (2000)
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2011 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
About this paper
Cite this paper
Di Cerbo, F., Dodero, G., Reggio, G., Ricca, F., Scanniello, G. (2011). Precise vs. Ultra-Light Activity Diagrams - An Experimental Assessment in the Context of Business Process Modelling. In: Caivano, D., Oivo, M., Baldassarre, M.T., Visaggio, G. (eds) Product-Focused Software Process Improvement. PROFES 2011. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 6759. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-21843-9_23
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-21843-9_23
Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg
Print ISBN: 978-3-642-21842-2
Online ISBN: 978-3-642-21843-9
eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)