a formal framework to generate xpdl specifications from uml activity diagrams
The XML Process Definition Language (XPDL) is a standardized language allowing process definitions interchange between a variety of tools ranging from workflow management systems to modeling and simulation tools. On the other hand, UML activity diagrams offer a convenient notation to depict synthetic and intuitive views of systems that facilitate stakeholder communication. However, there is currently no tool able to animate activity diagrams using workflow management systems. Moreover, despite standardization efforts, diagram interchange across different modeling tools remains an issue. Hence, transforming UML activity diagrams into XPDL specifications would preserve stakeholder communication while enabling animation tool support. This paper presents a formal and optimal transformation of UML activity diagrams into XPDL specifications. This mapping is described through a set of formal translation rules defined from the UML activity metamodel to the XPDL metamodel. We demonstrate that the defined mapping process preserves some structural properties specified on the translated UML activity diagram.
uml activity diagrams transformations xpdl language correctness proofs