Language Design
Object-Process Methodology (OPM) is a modeling language. OPM combines a minimal set of building blocks – stateful objects and processes that transform them – with a dual graphic-textual representation in a single diagram type.
OPM uses two types of elements: entities and links. Entities are used to express "physical" or "informational" elements which can be inside or outside of the system being designed, i.e. "systemic" or "environmental".
The entities used in OPM are objects, states and processes. An object is a thing existing for a period of time. A state is a situation an object can be in. A process is a phenomenon that transforms one or more objects by creating them, altering their states or destroying/consuming them.
The links used in OPM are structural links and procedural links. A structural link forms a relation between two objects and is persistent. A procedural link is used to link a process to an object - in which case it indicates a change in the state of the object - or to another process - in which case it indicates the launching of the second process when the first ends.
Read more about this topic: Object Process Methodology
Famous quotes containing the words language and/or design:
“Any language is necessarily a finite system applied with different degrees of creativity to an infinite variety of situations, and most of the words and phrases we use are “prefabricated” in the sense that we don’t coin new ones every time we speak.”
—David Lodge (b. 1935)
“If I knew for a certainty that a man was coming to my house with the conscious design of doing me good, I should run for my life ... for fear that I should get some of his good done to me,—some of its virus mingled with my blood.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)