BPMN Text Annotation

[Paolo F Cantoni]

Anyone have any idea why OMG decided to make the Text Annotation an Artifact and not a UML Note?

Seems a bit strange to me...

Paolo

[«Midnight»]

My guess is that this relates to how the BPMN folks (the "Notation Working Group") defined it in the first place. They seemed - IMHO - to have taken the approach that this is an element in and of itself, rather than the 'lightweight' implemtation of a note in UML.

Perhaps it is best to leave this to the philosophers to resolve...

[Paolo F Cantoni]

Well that leaves me with a problem.  I already have Notation Elements in my Universal Interface.  They have most of the standard attributes of EA elements.  They are currently used for UML Notes and Text Block.

I guess I can use the Note element for Text Annotation (unchanged).  I just map a BPMN Text Annotation Artifact to a Notation Element and vice versa.

Thoughts?

Paolo

[«Midnight»]

Seems to make sense. Where and why - in the sense of "what result are you seeking" - are you doing the mapping?

Just to be on the safe side, it might be worth looking up the most recent BPMN specification (1.0 or 1.1 if I remember) and scanning through to make sure they don't do or expect something exotic from their annotation elements.

I did not notice the spec on the OMG site, but if you can find it there you should have the best version. If not, look it up on the 'official' site http:// bpmn.org.

David

[«Midnight»]

I've looked into this a bit more. My guess is that you can use a note in place of BPMN's animal, at least as far as functionality goes. I don't think you can stereotype a UML note (at least in EA) so you will not be able to get the same graphic.

Otherwise, perhaps you can modify your current paradigm to look for the BPMN stereotype on artifacts. If it is not there proceed as you do now, if it is then treat it like a note.

[Paolo F Cantoni]

Seems to make sense. Where and why - in the sense of "what result are you seeking" - are you doing the mapping?

Well, my Universal Interface attempts to communicate the semantics of the either side.  So as I mentioned I already have elements for depicting Notations (whether Notes n diagrams, Text on diagrams, Notes attached to elements, Notes attached to features of elements).  It's compatible with UML, but not isomorphic.

So annotations are Notation Elements in my semantics.

Just to be on the safe side, it might be worth looking up the most recent BPMN specification (1.0 or 1.1 if I remember) and scanning through to make sure they don't do or expect something exotic from their annotation elements.

I'd already done that.  I'm using the Final Adopted Specification - Feb 2006 dtc/06-02-01.

It looks as though (as I previously mentioned) I can use the current notation element unchanged and do everything I need there.

My interface doesn't (for the moment) include graphical information, apart from noting what's on which diagram - as there are some semantics involved there.

My intention is to separate the rendering from the semantics.

Thanks for you help.

Paolo

[«Midnight»]

Paolo,

All this said, take a look at the most recent posts to your thread here:
http://www.sparxsystems.com.au/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.pl?board=UMLPRO;action=display;num=1147842092;start=10#10

Just want to make sure you don't happily proceed and get surprised by a presentation issue.

David

PS: I have not tried my own suggestion regarding shape scripts, as I have other fish to fry just now. If you do so, please let me know what if anything happens.