Documenting software architectures using UML

Abstract

Copyright © by the paper's authors. Copying permitted only for private and academic purposes. As software systems become large and more complex, focus on main design issues is shifted from algorithms and data structures. Software architecture, which represents high-level organization of software system, brings whole new set of design issues: overall system organization, global control structures, communication protocols, data access and synchronization, as well as choosing between different design solutions. In this paper, ways of using UML to document component and connector views are described. Following elements of component and connector view will be described using UML: components and component types, connectors and connector types, ports, roles, systems and properties.