How This Book Is Organized | UML 2 For Dummies

Here’s your first practical hint about using UML: Put about five to nine major elements on a diagram — no more. Studies have shown (we’ve always wondered who does this type of study) that most people have a hard time comprehending more than about nine elements at a time. Likewise, when designing this book, we decided to follow our own advice and to divide the book into just seven parts.

Remember that you don’t have to read this book in order. Just choose the parts and chapters that you need at the time.

Part I: UML and System Development

If you want to know what UML is (and why knowing it is useful), this is the place to go; it covers the basics of UML and how it can be used. You’ll also find some common principles for communicating or developing systems with UML. These principles guided the UML gurus when they created UML; the same principles can guide you to effective use of it. Ways to apply these principles crop up throughout the book.

Part II: The Basics of Object Modeling

When you model by using UML, the basics are the things (or objects) that you draw and the relationships among them. You’ll find information on classes, objects, associations, inheritances, and generalizations. No matter what type of development you do, understanding this part will probably be essential.

Part III: The Basics of Use-Case Modeling

Use cases (detailed real-world examples) allow you to understand and communicate the purpose of a system or its components. They are great for organizing your thoughts — and your system — when you want to get a value-added product out the door.

Part IV: The Basics of Functional Modeling

When the objects in your system get busy and you want to explain the details of their complex behavior, you’ll need a technique to do so. UML supplies several to choose from — and this part explains and compares them. You’ll see several different types of interaction diagrams (such as sequence, communication, and activity) in action, and discover how to combine them to create solutions, patterns, and frameworks. If you’re experienced with UML, you’ll find lots of new UML 2 stuff in this part.

Part V: Dynamic Modeling

Your objects are more that just clumps of data stuck together with a few functions. The objects that you develop are more like living things; they remember the past and live their lives by changing their states in response to incoming events. In this part, you can make sure that they get a life — and that you know how to explain it. Come to this part for state charts.

Part VI: Modeling the System’s Architecture

Whether you’re an architect, programmer, or construction worker, you build complex architectures. Computer systems and software applications distribute themselves across different hardware platforms — and spread throughout the Internet. This part outlines steps that you can use to design your systems for their mission by using system plans, packaging, and subsystems.

Part VII: The Part of Tens

Everyone enjoys making lists (and daydreaming that they’ll be read aloud, backward, on late-night talk shows). Here are our top-ten lists of useful tips, tools, Web sites, and diagrams. They’re likely to be your top-tens, too.