Performance by Unified Model Analysis (PUMA)

Evaluation of non-functional properties of a design (such as performance, dependability, security, etc.) can be enabled by design annotations specific to the property to be evaluated. Performance properties, for instance, can be annotated on UML designs by using the UML Profile for Schedulability, Performance and Time (SPT) . However the communication between the design description in UML and the tools used for non-functional properties evaluation requires support, particularly for performance where there are many alternative performance analysis tools that might be applied. This paper describes a tool architecture called PUMA, which provides a unified interface between different kinds of design information and different kinds of performance models, for example Markov models, stochastic Petri nets and process algebras, queues and layered queues. The paper concentrates on the creation of performance models. The unified interface of PUMA is centered on an intermediate model called Core Scenario Model (CSM), which is extracted from the annotated design model. Experience shows that CSM is also necessary for cleaning and auditing the design information, and providing default interpretations in case it is incomplete, before creating a performance model

A Compositional Semantics for UML State Machines Aimed at Performance Evaluation

Unified Modeling Language (UML) is gaining acceptance to describe the behaviour of systems. It has attracted the attention of researchers that are interested in deriving, automatically, performance evaluation models from system 's descriptions. A required step to automatically produce a performance model (as any executable model) is that the semantics of the description language is formally defined. Among the UML diagrams, we concentrate on States Machines (SMs) and we build a semantics for a significant subset of them in terms of Generalized Stochastic Petri Nets (GSPNs). The paper shows how to derive an executable GSPN model from a description of a system, expressed as a set of SMs. The semantics is compositional since the executable GSPN model is obtained by composing, using standard Petri net operators, the GSPN models of the single SMs, and each GSPN model is obtained by composition of submodels for SM basic features.

Analysing Internet Software Retrieval Systems: Modeling and Performance Comparison

Nowadays, there exist web sites that allow users to retrieve and install software in an easy way. The performance of these sites may be poor if they are used in wireless networks; the reason is the inadequate use of the net resources that they need. If this kind of systems are designed using mobile agent technology the previous problem might be avoided. In this paper, we present a comparison between the performance of a software retrieval system especially designed to be used in a wireless network and the performance of a software retrieval system similar to the well-known Tucows.com web site

From UML Activity Diagrams to Stochastic Petri Nets: Application To Software Performance Engineering

Over the last decade, the relevance of performance evaluation in the early stages of the software development life-cycle has been steadily rising. We honestly believe that the integration of formal models in the software engineering process is a must, in order to enable the application of well-known, powerful analysis techniques to software models. In previous papers the authors have stated a proposal for SPE, dealing with several UML diagram types. The proposal formalizes their semantics, and provides a method to translate them into (analyzable) GSPN models. This paper focuses on activity diagrams, which had not been dealt with so far. They will be incorporated in our SPE method, enhancing its expressivity by refining abstraction levels in the statechart diagrams. Performance requirements will be annotated according to the UML profile for schedulability, performance and time. Last but not least, our CASE tool prototype will be introduced. This tool deals with every model element from activity diagrams and ensures an automatic translation from ADs into GSPNs strictly following the process related in this paper

Performance Engineering based on UML & SPN's: A software performance tool

The increasing relevance of UML as a semi-formal modelling paradigm has entailed the need for an adjustment of the classical performance evaluation methods within the scope of the new working environment. Under these circumstances, a formal semantics for the UML language and a strong mathematical substratum are required in order to be able to compute performance estimates and validate logical properties in the first stages of the software life-cycle. We believe that stochastic Petri nets are specially suited for this aim. A compositional approach for the translation of several UML diagrams into analyzable Petri net models has therefore been considered in previous papers. Following this approach, we will focus here in the depiction of a model case study from the perspective of our new performance-oriented CASE tool

DICE simulation : a tool for software performance assessment at the design stage

In recent years, we have seen many performance fiascos in the deployment of new systems, such as the US health insurance web. This paper describes the functionality and architecture, as well as success stories, of a tool that helps address these types of issues. The tool allows assessing software designs regarding quality, in particular performance and reliability. Starting from a UML design with quality annotations, the tool applies model-transformation techniques to yield analyzable models. Such models are then leveraged by the tool to compute quality metrics. Finally, quality results, over the design, are presented to the engineer, in terms of the problem domain. Hence, the tool is an asset for the software engineer to evaluate system quality through software designs. While leveraging the Eclipse platform, the tool uses UML and the MARTE, DAM and DICE profiles for the system design and the quality modeling

Performance by Unified Model Analysis (PUMA)

Evaluation of non-functional properties of a design (such as performance, dependability, security, etc.) can be enabled by design annotations specific to the property to be evaluated. Performance properties, for instance,