Perverse UML for generating web applications using YAMDAT

In the current environment of accelerating technological change, software development continues to be difficult, unpredictable, expensive, and error-prone. Model Driven Architecture (MDA), sometimes known as Executable UML, offers a possible solution. MDA provides design notations with precisely defined semantics. Using these notations, developers can create a design model that is detailed and complete enough that the model can be verified and tested via simulation ("execution"). Design faults, omissions, and inconsistencies can be detected without writing any code. Furthermore, implementation code can be generated directly from the model. In fact, implementations in different languages or for different platforms can be generated from the same model. The YAMDAT™project (Yet Another Model Driven Architecture Tool) will provide a convenient suite of tools for design, collaboration, model verification, and code generation. Parts of the system (notably, the code generation for state machines) are already sufficiently well-developed to support development of complex C++ and Java systems. This paper describes an experiment in repurposing a standard UML component, the class diagram, to support the design and automatic code generation for a domain not usually considered for MDA: the page interactions of a web application.