A conceptual modeling environment should not be
merely usable but fun to use, so users want to use it rather
than feel compelled to do so because that’s
what they’ve been told.

conceptual modeling environment should not be merely usable but fun to use, so users want to use it rather than feel compelled to do so because that’s what they’ve been told. The OPM modeling approach has adapted this philosophy into the OPCAT environment to cater to our cognitive abilities (dual processing), limitations (limited capacity), and needs (active processing). Dual-channel processing is addressed through the model’s bimodal representation. Since technically oriented people usually prefer diagrams while others might favor text, individuals with both preference types are able to benefit from consulting one modality while inspecting the other. Domain experts and executives on the customer side should participate in eliciting and analyzing their system requirements, but pro-grammer-oriented modeling approaches and environments bar such involvement.

Devoid of the cryptic syntax normally found in programming languages, the OPM model is understandable to customer-side stakeholders, allowing them to inspect the model, understand the system they should expect, and verify that the model meets their requirements. Switching between graphics and text, OPM system modelers are less likely to make costly design errors, while model readers are more likely to comprehend the system and detect design mistakes or omissions that might otherwise slip by. OPM addresses our limited cognitive capacity by providing abstraction/refinement mechanisms that enable complexity management. Active processing is facilitated by animated simulation that helps detect costly design errors. Further, OPL’s formality is a basis for generating the designed application automatically. This capability reduces the modeler’s manual translations of the modeled requirements, narrowing the gap between requirements and implementation.

All professions and organizations today demand lifelong learning, so designers of modeling environments must be able to account for the variety of human preferences and learning styles. The holistic OPM paradigm, with its intuitive implementation, is an example of a forward-thinking approach that

could be adopted in future modeling and learning environments. Indeed, work is under way for the Object Management Group’s scheduled release of SysML 2.0 in 2009 or 2010 to utilize OPM elements, including the addition of textual representations to SysML diagram types in order to achieve bimodal representation for dual-channel processing. ^c

 

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DOV DORI ( [e-mail]) is an associate professor in the William Davidson Faculty of Industrial Engineering and Management at the Technion, Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa, Israel.

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