Visual modeling of object-oriented distributed systems

Software engineering for distributed systems is a notoriously hard problem. While common approaches for structural modeling like object-oriented analy sis and design offer several benefits, their current support for distribute d system design is rather limited. The visual notations for structural mode ling can be adjusted to the demands of distributed systems. The behavior mo deling notations fail w.r.t. the most crucial aspects. Often the domain-spe cific behavior notations that have been proposed in this context for the UM L neither support concurrency as needed nor do they allow to describe scala ble behavior. An object-oriented design technique based on UML notations an d a special type of high-level Petri-Nets that overcomes these limitations is presented. It is demonstrated how a visual design language can support t he crucial aspects for distributed system design as well as how these aspec ts can be smoothly integrated into a single language with multiple consiste nt views. (C) 2001 Academic Press.