Conceptual Modeling Based on Transformation Linguistic Patterns

Many object-oriented development approaches specify the system functional requirements by means of use cases. During the requirements analysis, these approaches generally agree on expressing the system behaviour using two representations: the Object Model and the Interaction Model. The Interaction Model development is subordinated to the Object Model construction, which provides the former with the basic information of the object classes. The Interaction Model contributes to identifying the class operations. Although these models are closely linked and their development is supposed to be iterative, in practice, there are no established mechanisms that guarantee the consistency of both models throughout their construction. The Interaction Model information is also under-used or underestimated in the Object Model. Persistent connections between the analysis models and the Use Case Model are not recognized. A framework to simultaneously construct the Object Model and the Interaction Model from use cases is described in this paper. Its main purpose is to strengthen the information exchange between the models so that it is complementary and consistent. To fulfil this purpose, the framework is centered on a transformation model based on linguistic patterns.