Relating computer systems to sequence diagrams: the impact of underspecification and inherent nondeterminism

Abstract

Having a sequence diagram specification and a computer system, we need to answer the question: Is the system compliant with the sequence diagram specification in the desired way? We present a procedure for answering this question for sequence diagrams with underspecification and inherent nondeterminism. The procedure is independent of any concrete technology, and relies only on the execution traces that may be produced by the system. If all traces are known, the procedure results in either “compliant” or “not compliant”. If only a subset of the traces is known, the conclusion may also be “likely compliant” or “likely not compliant”.