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AnnaBobkowska,MaciejSomla
1.1.TheRoleofModellingLanguagesandModellingTools
Modellingtoolssupportmodellingandifweeliminatemodellinglanguages
fromouranalysis,weendupwithadifferentclassoftoolsfortextualdocumenta-
tionsupport.Whensearchingforbenefitswhichcouldbeachievedwithoutany
modellingtools,onecanseeafewbenefitsrelatedtodiagramsketches.Theyare
usefulmainlyforindividualwork.Thebenefitsinclude:possibilitytodealwith
complexityofsystembypresentingitatahigherlevelofabstraction,supportfor
micro-processofsoftwaredevelopmentbyfocusingdeveloper’sattentiononap-
propriateaspectsandthensupportforiterativeelaborationofthemodel.However,
thebenefitsfromusingmodelswithoutanytoolsinsoftwaredevelopmentareli-
mitedevenforindividualwork.Thetoolsfacilitatemodifications,enablestoring,
versioningandmultipleprinting,andimprovereadabilityofdocumentation.They
becomemoreimportantasthesizeofmodelincreases.Anothergroupofbenefitsis
relatedtoautomation,whichmeansthatsometasksareperformedbythetools
insteadofdevelopers,e.g.checkingsyntax,checkingconsistencybetweendia-
grams,generatingcodeordocumentation.
Inordertoachievebenefitsforgroupwork,thetoolsarenecessary.Theyfacili-
tatecommunicationatthetimeofprojectandaccesstoinformationaboutproducts
atthephaseofmaintenance.Theyenablesharingmodelsbetweenteammembers
anddeliveringthemtocustomers.Theysupportcoordinationoftasksrelatedto
softwaremodelsandtheyallowdistributedworkonprojects.
Tosummarizetheroleofeachofthem,modellinglanguagessupportinternal
representationsandthinkingwhilemodellingtoolssupportprocessing,storingand
sharingmodels.Theroleofmodellingtoolsissurprisinglylargeandonlywithboth
ofthemitispossibletoachieveproject-levelbenefits,suchasbetterqualityof
documentation,betterqualityofsoftwareandshortertime-to-market,aswellas
organization-levelbenefits,suchasstoringorganizationalknowledge,moremature
developmentprocess,potentialtosucceedwithlargerprojectsandimprovements
inefficiencyoflargeprojects.
1.2.ResearchQuestionsandaSketchofSolution
UML[6]isstandardmodellinglanguageandtherearemanyUMLtoolsonthe
marketnowadays.Additionally,onecanobservefastprogress.Thetoolssupport
softwaredevelopersindifferentdegreedependingontheirquality.Thus,thefol-
lowingresearchquestionscanbeposed:Whatisthestateoftechnologyabout
UMLtoolsnowadays?Howtotracetheprogressintechnology?Whichquality
criteriaarerelevantforevaluationandcomparisonofUMLtools?
ThispaperdescribesaqualitymodelforUMLtoolsanddemonstratesitsuse-
fulnessforsearchingneededtoolsaswellasanalysingthestateoftechnologyof