I think many of us would agree that the (practically inexistent) interoperability among current UML tools is one of the problems that limit the adoption of modeling techniques. The last thing companies want is to be tied to a specific software tool.
In theory, the XMI (XML Metadata Interchange) standard format should have solved this problem a long time ago but the reality is that each tool uses its own XMI “standard” to save the models, usually incompatible with the one expected by any other tool. To sum up, we are far away from the model once open anywhere
If you think I’m exaggerating just take a look at the XMI file exported by the well-known Microsoft Visio, MagicDraw, Eclipse UML2 AND ArgoUML tools to represent the following UML diagram (excerpt of a typical rental car system)
But don’t lose your hope just yet!. The OMG is working hard to solve this problem.
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FNR Pearl Chair. Head of the Software Engineering RDI Unit at LIST. Affiliate Professor at University of Luxembourg. More about me.
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