Towards a New Generation of Software Design Environments: Supporting the Use of Informal and Formal Notations with OctoUML

Software architects seek efficient support for planning and designing models. Many software design tools lack flexibility in combining informal and formal design. In this paper, we present OctoUML, a proof of a concept of a new generation software design environment that supports an effective software design process. The system provides options for collaborative software design and different input methods for creation of software models at various levels of formality. The design and architecture of OctoUML are also presented. The evaluation shows that OctoUML provides a user-friendly environment and has the potential to effectively support the activities of the designers.

[1]  André van der Hoek,et al.  How Software Designers Interact with Sketches at the Whiteboard , 2015, IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering.

[2]  Michel R. V. Chaudron,et al.  How effective is UML modeling ? , 2012, Software & Systems Modeling.

[3]  Marian Petre,et al.  UML in practice , 2013, 2013 35th International Conference on Software Engineering (ICSE).

[4]  Anselm L. Strauss,et al.  Basics of qualitative research : techniques and procedures for developing grounded theory , 1998 .

[5]  Christian Heide Damm,et al.  Tool support for cooperative object-oriented design: gesture based modelling on an electronic whiteboard , 2000, CHI.

[6]  References , 1971 .

[7]  Barbara Tversky,et al.  What do Sketches Say about Thinking , 2002 .

[8]  Stephan Diehl,et al.  Sketches and diagrams in practice , 2014, Software Engineering & Management.

[9]  Norbert Seyff,et al.  FlexiSketch: A Mobile Sketching Tool for Software Modeling , 2012, MobiCASE.

[10]  M. Sheelagh T. Carpendale,et al.  Visual Thinking In Action: Visualizations As Used On Whiteboards , 2011, IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics.

[11]  Barbara Tversky,et al.  Visualizing Thought , 2011, Top. Cogn. Sci..

[12]  Robert DeLine,et al.  Let's go to the whiteboard: how and why software developers use drawings , 2007, CHI.

[13]  Thomas S. Tullis,et al.  A Comparison of Questionnaires for Assessing Website Usability , 2004 .

[14]  John C. Grundy,et al.  An e-whiteboard application to support early design-stage sketching of UML diagrams , 2003, IEEE Symposium on Human Centric Computing Languages and Environments, 2003. Proceedings. 2003.

[15]  Tracy Anne Hammond,et al.  PaleoSketch: accurate primitive sketch recognition and beautification , 2008, IUI '08.

[16]  Michel R. V. Chaudron,et al.  A Vision on a New Generation of Software Design Environments , 2015, HuFaMo@MoDELS.

[17]  Juhani Iivari,et al.  Why are CASE tools not used? , 1996, CACM.

[18]  Stephan Kopf,et al.  A Collaborative Multi-Touch UML Design Tool , 2013 .

[19]  M. Sheelagh T. Carpendale,et al.  Follow that sketch: Lifecycles of diagrams and sketches in software development , 2011, 2011 6th International Workshop on Visualizing Software for Understanding and Analysis (VISSOFT).

[20]  N. Hoffart.  Basics of Qualitative Research: Techniques and Procedures for Developing Grounded Theory , 2000 .

[21]  Michel R. V. Chaudron,et al.  OctoUML: An Environment for Exploratory and Collaborative Software Design , 2017, 2017 IEEE/ACM 39th International Conference on Software Engineering Companion (ICSE-C).

[22]  André van der Hoek,et al.  Supporting informal design with interactive whiteboards , 2014, CHI.

[23]  J. B. Brooke,et al.  SUS: A 'Quick and Dirty' Usability Scale , 1996 .