I have searched and searched and searched for online documentation on UML 2.0 OR constraints and can find practically nothing. I get on OMG's UML website and can't even begin to find information on diagram elements. What am I doing wrong here???
This is the most recent notation reference that I can find, but it's still for version 1.5..
www.omg.org/docs/formal/03-03-10.pdf
It briefly describes constraints in general, but doesn't really get into how they are applied --such as for Activity diagrams.
I don't believe that the details of modeling an activity diagram have changed significantly in UML 2.0 but then I have not read in full the 2.0 specification.
Here's the official UML 2.0 specification (a bit hard to read): http://www.omg.org/spec/UML/2.1.2/ -> take a look at the Superstructure
For the official UML info, your main resource is http://www.uml.org; there you'll find links to many UML 2.0 resources including articles, tutorials, tools, etc.
- Adrian
Thanks for assisting me, Adrian.
I reviewed the Superstructure document earlier today; it's obviously not something that I can just peruse and expect to comprehend. I just find it hard to accept that there is no simple reference about OR constraints and how they can be applied toward Activity diagrams. I was about to start using forks for what I thought was a perfectly legitimate reason, and then I found one obscure example that used a decision instead of a fork which happens to be, according to you, the correct way to model that scenario. That's pretty frustrating for a beginner!
Again, thanks for the help.
Vinny,
Take a look at the following resource. I think it may help with many of the questions that I have seen you asking.
http://www.bpmn.org/Documents/Notations%20and%20Workflow%20Patterns.pdf
This document talk about a number of standard workflow patterns AND how to model thme in both UML and BPMN. So it's easy to compare and contrast the two notations for both strengths and weaknesses.
brought to you by enabling practitioners & organizations to achieve their goals using: