7.3 Advanced State Diagrams

To be flexible and powerful, the UML allows you to put one or more state diagrams inside a single state to indicate that when an element is in that state, other elements inside of it have their own states. For example, within the Active state of the project management system, each object and subsystem has its own state, and the state diagram for each element may be shown inside the Active state of the project management system or by using the element's own state diagram. This recursive nature of state diagrams is very powerful, because it allows you to learn the basic notation of state diagrams and reapply it to nested state diagrams without having to learn more notation.

In the UML, a state may be shown as a rectangle with rounded corners and three compartments separated by horizontal solid lines. Figure 7-5 shows the Active state of the project management system with three compartments. The top compartment of a state contains the name of the state or a description of the situation of the element.

The middle compartment of a state may contain transitions for the following special events:

entry

Indicates the action to be performed when the element enters the state

exit

Indicates the action to be performed when the element exits the state

do

Indicates the action to be performed continuously while the element is in the state

Figure 7-5 shows that when the project management system enters the Active state, a message is logged using the LogMessage action. When the project management system exits the Active state, the user's date and time is retrieved using the getDateAndTime action of the OS object. Finally, when the project management system is in the Active state, it continuously monitors its usage using the MonitorUsage action.

The bottom compartment of a state may contain one or more nested state diagrams separated by dashed lines, each with a title that describes the element to which the state diagram pertains. When a state becomes the current state of an element, all its nested state diagrams become active concurrently.

Figure 7-5 shows that when the project management system enters the Active state, the following nested state diagrams each has a current state:

Main Graphical User Interface Window or Foreground Processing

Describes the lifecycle of the user interface. There are two states, including the Shown state, which indicates that the user interface is visible to the user, and the Hidden state, which indicates that the user interface is not visible to the user. The Hide event makes the user interface not visible to the user, and the Show event makes the user interface visible to the user.

Background Processing

Describes the lifecycle of how the system works as it is handling requests from the user. There are two states, including the Idle state, which indicates that the project management system is not handling any user request, and the Busy state, which indicates that the project management system is handling a user request. The DoProcessing event makes the project management system busy handling a user request, and the ProcessingComplete event makes the project management system idle waiting to handle a user request.

Figure 7-5. Advanced state diagrams

All the transitions going from a state pertain to each nested state diagram; if one of these nested state diagrams activates an outgoing transition, all nested state diagrams are forcibly exited. Figure 7-5 indicates that when the project management system is in the Active state and a Severe Error event occurs, both nested state diagrams are terminated independent of which nested state diagram caused the event to occur.