Datasheet

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Part I ✦ An Introduction to UML
Summary
UML grew out of the increasingly complex challenge to build systems that not only
met users’ requirements but that could withstand the ever-changing technological
environment. Change, complexity, and speed conspired to focus critical attention
on how to build robust, durable systems. One result was a standard language for
modeling systems, the Unified Modeling Language (UML).
But the desire for truly industry-capable tools to build systems did not stop there.
The OMG has continued to spearhead the effort to build a comprehensive strategy
in the form of Model-Driven Architecture (MDA).
There are a lot of languages involved in these strategies. Here’s how they all relate:
✦ The Meta Object Facility (MOF) defines a common meta-language for building
other languages.
✦ UML defines a meta-language, derived from the MOF, for describing object-
oriented systems.
✦ The Common Warehouse Metamodel defines a meta-language, derived from
the MOF, for describing data warehousing and related systems.
✦ XML Metadata Interchange defines the means to share models derived from
the MOF.
✦✦✦
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