ASM Semantic Modeling and Checking for Sequence Diagram

UML sequence diagram is widely adopted in interactive software systems. Sequence diagram flexibly describes the process that message transfer among objects, is easy to understand but lacks precise definition of semantics. On the contrary, temporal logics or Z language can give semantic description, but they overly depend on logics, which makes it difficult to apply widely in industry. By combining rules with multi-agents, ASM can accurately define semantics but avoid the complexity of temporal logics and Z language. Also, by the intelligence of agents, control the model checking. It does not only refine the process level by level, but also is easy to understand and illustrate. We thus propose the ASM semantic model for sequence diagram in order to accurately describe the model's characteristics and improve the testing process of large systems. In this paper, we give formal syntaxes and rule definitions. An example is also provided. Future applications are discussed in the end.