A Model-driven Approach to Transform SysML Internal Block Diagrams to UML Activity Diagrams

The design of current software systems must take care not only of software but also of other elements, such as processes, hardware and flows. For the software design counterpart, both for structural and dynamic views, UML is currently widely applied. As UML lacks proper means to model systems elements, the Systems Modeling Language (SysML), a UML profile, was introduced by OMG. The proposal of this paper is to create a semi-automatic transformation that generates a UML Activity diagram from a SysML Internal Block Diagram. The hypothesis is that, by using parts, the main block and its flows, it is possible to create a semi-automatic transformation that generates a UML Activity diagram from a SysML Internal Block diagram preserving all information. A mapping describing the relationship between the two diagrams and a semi-automatic model-driven transformation using the ATL language are proposed. The approach is applied to a Distiller system for purifying dirty water, a real-world example described by the SysML team.