Describing the syntax and semantics of UML statecharts in a heterogeneous modelling environment

In this paper UML statechart diagrams are used as an example of a generic approach to integrating a visual language in a heterogeneous modelling and simulation environment.Asystem represented in a visual language is syntactically defined as an attributed graph, with well-formedness rules specified by a set of firstorder predicates over the abstract syntax of the graph. The language semantics are specified by an Abstract State Machine (ASM) parameterized with syntacticallycorrect attributed graphs. In this paper the key issues in the definition of UML statechart semantics are highlighted.Yan Jin, Robert Esser and Jörn W. Jannec