The Object Constraint Language: Precise Modeling With Uml (Addison-Wesley Object Technology Series) - Softcover

Warmer, Jos B.; Kleppe, Anneke G.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0201379406 ISBN 13: 9780201379402

Publisher: Addison-Wesley, 1998

Synopsis

A practical guide to the OCL (part of the UML 1.0 standard of the OMG), this title is designed for software architects, designers, and developers. The authors' pragmatic approach and illustrative use of examples help application developers to quickly get up to speed with this important object modeling technique.

About this title

About the Author

Jos Warmer is the primary author of the OCL standard. He is an active member of the Unified Modeling Language (UML) Revision Task Force, which defined the revisions in the UML 2.0 standard. Previously he was a member of the UML core team, where he was responsible for the development of the Object Constraint Language (OCL). The author of several books and numerous international articles, Jos is an advisor on the UML method and techniques at the De Nederlandsche Bank.

Anneke Kleppe is a consultant and adviser at Klasse Objecten, which she founded in 1995 to train and coach companies on the use of object technology, modeling, and MDA. She was intensively involved in the development of the Unified Modeling Language (UML) and the new UML 2.0 standard. The author of several books, Anneke started a knowledge center for object technology at KPN Research in Leidschendam, Netherlands. She is a member of the authoring team of the OCL 2 standard, where she has a special focus on the definition of the semantics of the OCL.

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From the Back Cover

--Grady Booch, Ivar Jacobson, James Rumbaugh

The Object Constraint Language (OCL) is a new notational language, a subset of the industry standard Unified Modeling Language, that allows software developers to write constraints over object models. These constraints are particularly useful, as they allow a developer to create a highly specific set of rules that governs the aspect of an individual object. As many software projects today require unique and complex rules that are written specifically for business models, OCL is fast becoming an integral facet of object development.

This book is a practical guide to OCL for software architects, designers, and developers. Because it is designed for ease and usability, OCL is likely to gain broad acceptance. Much care has been taken during the design of OCL to ensure that the syntax is readable and writable by the average software modeler. The straightforward nature of OCL makes it a natural candidate to supersede current constraint languages. The authors' pragmatic approach and illustrative use of examples will help application developers to get up to speed quickly with this important object modeling method.

Other highlights:

• Detailed instruction explains how and why to use OCL, showing its relation to UML
• Illuminating case study demonstrates several UML diagrams and corresponding constraints
• Provides keen insight from the primary author of the OCL standard portion of the UML 1.1 standard of the OMG

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From the Inside Flap

In November 1997, the Object Management Group (OMG) set a standard for object-oriented analysis and design facilities. The standard, known as the Unified Modeling Language (UML), includes model diagrams, their semantics, and an interchange format between CASE tools. Within UML, the Object Constraint Language (OCL) is the standard for specifying invariants, preconditions, postconditions, and other kinds of constraints.

The only way we can gain anything from a standard is if everyone uses it. Therefore, any standard should be easy to use, easy to learn, and easy to understand. These objectives were our guidelines during the development of OCL.

OCL can be called a "formal" language, but unlike other currently available formal languages such as Objective-Z or VDM++, OCL is not designed for people who have a strong mathematical background. The users of OCL are the same people as the users of UML: software developers with an interest in object technology. OCL is designed for usability, although it is underpinned by mathematical set theory and logic.

Our objective in writing this book is to offer to practitioners of object technology a convenient way to become acquainted with and make use of this part of the UML standard. By writing this book we intend to make OCL available to everyone who can benefit from it. Using, learning, and communicating with OCL should be easy, and this book is an effort to make it easy.

With this book we emphasize the importance of constraints in object-oriented analysis and design and the importance of a formal, separate language for constraint notation. Please take OCL and use it well, so that the whole object-oriented community will gain from your efforts. Acknowledgments

Although on the cover of any book only the names of the authors appear, a book is always the result of the blood, sweat, and tears of many people. For their efforts in reviewing this book we would like to thank Balbir Barn, Steve Cook, Wilfried van Hulzen, John Hogg, Jim Odell, and Cor Warmer. Special thanks go to Heidi Kuehn, who did a great job polishing our English.

Acknowledgments for their contributions to OCL must undoubtedly go to the following:

The IBM team that developed the first version of OCL: Mark Skipper, Anna Karatza, Aldo Eisma, Steve Cook, and Jos Warmer.

The joint submission team from IBM and ObjecTime. The ObjecTime team was composed of John Hogg, Bran Selic, and Garth Gullekson, and the IBM team consisted of Steve Cook, Dipayan Gangopadhyay, Mike Meier, Subrata Mitra, and Jos Warmer. On an individual basis, Marc Saaltink, Alan Wills, and Anneke Kleppe also contributed.

The UML 1.1 team, especially the semi-formal subgroup of the UML core team: Guus Ramackers, Gunnar Overgaard, and Jos Warmer.

Several people who influenced OCL during this period, most notably Desmond D'Souza, Alan Wills, Steve Cook, John Hogg, and James Rumbaugh.

The many persons who gave their feedback on the earlier versions of OCL.

We would also like to thank all our teachers, colleagues, clients, and friends who in the past 15 years made us aware of the need for a practical form of formalism in software development. Coming from a theoretical background (mathematics and theoretical computer science), we have always found sound formalisms appealing, but very early in our careers we decided that writing a two-page "proof" for five lines of code is not the right way to improve our software. We have been searching ever since for a way to combine our love for sound and complete formalisms with our sense of practicality. We hope and expect that OCL will turn out to be just that: a practical formalism. Anneke Kleppe and Jos Warmer
October 1998, Soest, Netherlands

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Edition details

• Publisher: Addison-Wesley
• Publication date: 1998
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0201379406
• ISBN 13: 9780201379402
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 112