PIM4SOA graphical editors

The PIM4SOA identifies four aspects where specific concerns can be addressed:

• Information: in the context of virtual enterprises information represents one of the most important elements and other aspects are based on it.
• Service: our main intention is to be able to describe SOA indepently from the technologies used. Service represents business accesible functionality
• Process: Processes describe a set of interactions amongst services in terms of messages exchanged
• Quality of service: Based on the current proposal, we have integrated the main elements to describe quality of services.

The PIM4SOA graphical editors support three different aspects; information, service and process.

The PIM4SOA has been implemented as a plugin for its use in the Eclipse platform. Other ATHENA tools need to have been installed to use this plugin.

• Download Eclipse 3.2 from: http://www.eclipse.org/downloads
• After installing Eclipse 3.2 select Help->Software Updates->Find and Install

• Select to Search for new features to install

• Add a "New Remote Site...".
• Enter "http://www.modelbased.net/pim4soa/update".

• Select the both the PIM4SOA update site and the Callisto Discovery Site, then select Finish.

• Select the features to install. Start by selecting the Graphical Modeling Framework, then push Select Required. After that select PIM4SOA Graphical Editor and PIM4SOA Metamodel. Then select next.

• Accept the terms in the license agreements and select next

• Select the install location (default works fine)
• Agree to "Install all"
• Restart the workbench after the installation is finished

Having installed this plugin, users can edit PIM4SOA models. This plugin provides a graphical editor to instantiate PIM4SOA models and also display already created PIM4SOA models. 

To create a new PIM4SOA model with the graphical editors it is important to start with the information diagram. The following steps instructs users to create a new PIM4SOA model:

• Create a new empty project (if one does not already exist) in the Eclipse workspace File->New->Project->General->Project

• Create a new PIM4SOA model File->New->Other
• And then select Examples -> Pim4soaInformation Diagram as it is shown in the picture below

• Assign the new PIM4SOA model to the project created previously and select a name for the model.

• This will create two files, one pim4soa model file and one pim4soa_information file.
• Now it is possible to model the information aspect of the PIM4SOA. Experiment with it or continue the tutorial to learn how to model the service aspect.

• Create a new collaboration in your model. This must be done in order to model the service aspect of the PIM4SOA model. See picture.

• Go to the Navigator or Package Explorer to find your newly created PIM4SOA model.
• Right click the model and select 'Initialize pim4soa_service diagram file'

• Keep the default properties and select next

• Find and select the collaboration element in your model and select finish

• Now it is possible to model the serivce aspect of the PIM4SOA. Experiment with it or continue the tutorial to learn to model the process aspect.

• Create a new process. This must be done in order to model the process aspect of the PIM4SOA model. See picture.

• Go to the Navigator or Package Explorer to find your PIM4SOA model.
• Right click the model and select 'Initialize pim4soa_process diagram file'

• Keep the default properties and select next

• Find and select the process element in your model and select finish

• Now it is possible to model the process aspect of the PIM4SOA. Experiment with it.

• If you have a PIM4SOA model file you want to visualize just right click the file and select one of the three different aspects available: