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Questions tagged [uml]

The Unified Modeling Language is the industry standard for modeling software-intensive systems.

UML is used to specify, visualize, and document a system's architecture through data, business object and component modeling. It can be used throughout the development cycle of the software, and is not language-dependent. It includes a set of graphic notation techniques to create visual models (diagrams, see below) of systems.

UML diagrams overview

Further Reading

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UML class diagram notations: Differences between Association, Aggregation and Composition

I'm confused about some of the notations of UML class diagrams. Pretty sure I know what Association means. Any relationship between instances of two classes, where an instance of one class needs to know about an instance of the second class in…
Aviv Cohn
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Is code commonly generated from UML?

So when I was at university I was educated on the benefits of UML and its future in code development. But from my industry experience, I've found that while we do use diagrams—ranging from ER diagrams, class diagrams, state diagrams, to work flow…
RoboShop
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How often do you use Formal UML?

I used ad-hoc MUML (made-up modeling language) to design and explain system fairly frequently. It looks similar to UML and tends to be pretty well understood. However, I've had a professor or two that harped on the use of strict, formal UML, as…
Fishtoaster
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UML Diagrams of Multi-Threaded Applications

For single-threaded applications I like to use class diagrams to get an overview of the architecture of that application. This type of diagram, however, hasn’t been very helpful when trying to understand heavily multi-threaded/concurrent…
PersonalNexus
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Why is UML not used in most free software (e.g. on Linux)?

I'm trying to understand why UML is not used in most free software projects. For example, my Debian/Linux system has probably more than ten thousand free software packages, and I cannot name even one which has been developed using explicit UML…
Basile Starynkevitch
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What are functional programmers using in place of UML?

I'm CS student. I am currently attending lectures, where we're taught Objective Analysis and Design. It consists mostly of writing use cases, analysing the problem that we can face when writing some application for the client, and how to design the…
MatthewRock
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Is documenting a big project with UML Diagrams needed, good to have or even not possible?

I developed a big(ger) project, which is in use already and grows, gets altered, fixed, etc. every week. Until now I am the only developer. Since the team has to grow, also we will be more developers on that project. The code is mostly self-speaking…
Edgar Alloro
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Mapping between 4+1 architectural view model & UML

I'm a bit confused about how the 4+1 architectural view model maps to UML. Wikipedia gives the following mapping: Logical view: Class diagram, Communication diagram, Sequence diagram. Development view: Component diagram, Package diagram Process…
Sadeq Dousti
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Are UML class diagrams adequate to design JavaScript systems?

Given that UML is oriented towards a more classic approach to object orientation, is it still usable in a reliable way to design JavaScript systems? One specific problem that I can see is that class diagrams are, in fact, a structural view of the…
Julio Rodrigues
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How important are UML diagrams for a successful project?

I'm in the middle of a project and I was asked to write UML diagrams (use cases,class diagram,etc). The project isn't very complex. I was wondering if this be a waste of my time? Should I just be doing other fun stuff like writing code? And when is…
Wissem
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What are the benefits of modeling software systems vs. doing it all in code?

Most, if not all IT people I know believe that it is beneficial to model software with UML or other types of diagrams before coding. (My question is not about UML specifically, it could be any graphical or textual description of the software…
Frank Puffer
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Which UML diagrams are still being widely used?

I teach software engineering at undergraduate level and I have a question to UML practitioners. Most software engineering textbooks take a serious effort in covering UML diagrams. But on the other hand, I heard from many graduates that UML does not…
DYZ
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What are the essential things one needs to know about UML?

I want my scribbles of a program's design and behaviour to become more streamlined and have a common language with other developers. I looked at UML and in principle it seems to be what I'm looking for, but it seems to be overkill. The information I…
Hanno Fietz
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How do I represent nested actions in a UML activity diagram?

This question is very similar to this one, but the answer doesn't match my needs. It's focused on a specific UML tool (Papyrus) whereas my question is more general about UML. I would like to represent a nested action in an activity diagram, but I…
Tim
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"UML is the worst thing to ever happen to MDD." Why?

William Cook in a tweet wrote that: "UML is the worst thing to ever happen to MDD. Fortunately many people now realize this ..." I would like to know the reasoning behind that claim (apparently, I'm not referring to his personal opinion). I've…
Flo
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