SysML Activity and Activity Parameters

[rothnic]

I just submitted this, but adding it here as well so it is searchable by others, since there is no issue tracking we have access to.

Issue
Many times when creating SysML compliant Activity Diagrams I run into the issue that Activity Parameters are not added to an activity through the right click menu, in the containment tree.

Additionally, when creating an Activity (even through the SysML menu), the composite diagram created for it will be the UML version. This means that you cannot show the Activity frame, to show activity parameters, unless you are so intimate with the product and SysML that you know you need to go change the diagram type to a SysML Activity Diagram.

Finally, there appears to be a difference in what I've seen in A practical guide to SysML, where the pin name and type on a call behavior action correspond to the activity parameter name and type for the given Activity. EA treats the Activity Parameter name as the type for the pin on a call behavior action. See 11.3.1.4 in SysML 1.3 specification. See this quote from the mentioned book, "A call behavior action has a pin for each parameter of the called behavior, and the characteristics of those pins must match the multiplicity and type of their corresponding parameters on the invoked behavior." This means that the behavior of EA causes a mismatch in the object flow from the boundary of an Activity's Activity Parameter, to a pin on a call behavior action.

Steps to Reproduce

• Right click on a package, and choose to add an Activity via the SysML toolset.
• Right click on the Activity, then add the composite diagram.
• Right click on the Activity, and add more Activities
• Open the root Activity's composite diagram.
• Drag and drop the nested Activities as invocations
• Right click the diagram (can't show frame)
• Manually set diagram type
• Right click diagram, show frame
• Right click the root Activity, select add element, activity parameter (nothing appears 95% of the time...sometimes spamming this many times will make it add it. Sometimes doing this on a nested activity adds the activity parameter to the root Activity.)
• If it doesn't appear, the only for sure way to add the Activity Parameter is to add it through the properties menu for the Activity.

Add Activity Parameter to nested Activity

• Right click a call behavior action added earlier, choose structured elements, add the pin (notice the type is now the name of the Activity Parameter)

[rothnic]

Sparx Response

1. The issue regarding adding Activity Parameters is resolved in EA 11 Beta1.

2. We have confirmed the issue regarding the 'Composite Structure Diagram' of the SysML Activity element.
This will be resolved in a future release of EA.

3. The Action Pin notation issue is resolved in EA 11 Beta1 (Change "C12121261").