Welcome to the exff Pages

At this point the exff capability is all implemented as XML Stylesheets (XSLT). Therefore, to perform the UML->EXPRESS and EXPRESS->UML transformations, all you need is an XSLT transform engine. You also need the UML and EXPRESS tools with which you want to work as well. The following describes the process for getting the exff demonstrator working. If you use other software tools, follow their installation instructions.

The exff demonstrator uses the following software:

• for the UML-to-EXPRESS conversion;
  • to create the UML/XMI - Poseidon Community Edition;
  • to extract the UML/XMI file from the Poseidon compressed model file - a unzip command line wrapper for WinZip;
  • to execute the XSLT transform of UML/XMI into EXPRESS - Microsoft MSXSL.
• for the EXPRESS-to-UML conversion;
  • to generate the EXPRESS XML from EXPRESS text - Eurostep EXPRESS Parser (EEP);
  • to execute the XSLT transform of the EXPRESS XML into UML/XMI - Microsoft MSXSL;
  • to create the compressed UML/XMI file for Poseidon CE - a zip command line wrapper for WinZip;
  • to read the UML model - Poseidon Community Edition.

The exff demonstrator also requires that the XSLT, DTDs and other files used are in the appropriate directories on your computer.

Installing Poseidon CE

Poseidon CE is freely available on the Web. It requires Java Development Kit 1.4 JDK 1.4.

1. Read the Poseidon Community Edition installation guide and follow the instructions found there.
2. Download Poseidon CE. exff was tested against version 1.6.
3. Create a directory or folder to contain the Poseidon CE UML models, we'll call this the PosWork folder from here on.
4. Place the exff Poseidon template and example in the PosWork folder.
5. Start Poseidon CE, open the example and make sure you can see the diagram.
6. Exit Poseidon CE and continue to the next installation step.
7. Read the UML Usage Guide before creating your own model or modifying the template!

Installing Command Line WinZip

1. Install WinZip (any other ZIP/UNZIP utility will work too).
2. Read the WinZip Command Line Support Add-On Release 1.0 installation page and follow the instructions found there.

If you do not have WinZip or the command line support you can also open the Poseidon "zargo" files with any uncompress utility and extract the XMI file. The XMI file is the input to the XSLT stylesheets that create the EXPRESS.

Installing MSXSL

1. Download MSXSL and follow the installation instructions. This link worked as of July 1, 2003. This utility uses the Microsoft XML Parser to perform the transformation.

Any XSLT processor will work with exff. If MSXSL isn't available for you, try the Apache XML Project software called Xalan - Java.

Installing EEP

Download EEP from the Eurostep Web site under "products & services" and follow the installation instructions found there. The e2u DOS batch files show the options directing EEP to generate XML from EXPRESS text.

Installing exff

exff can be installed by following these instructions:

1. create a new folder to contain exff;
2. copy the single ZIP file containing all software into that folder;
3. unzip the ZIP file retaining the folder structure within the ZIP file;
4. please do not rename or delete these folders or anything in these folders;
5. edit the DOS batch files with the names of the folders for use on your system;
6. rename the DOS batch files from a .txt extension to a .bat extension (this is the only case where you need to rename anything);
7. put shortcuts to these DOS batch files on your desktop so you can drag-and-drop EXPRESS text and UML tool files onto them.

exff Files and Directories

The exff folders named "dtd", "xsl" and "utils_samples" contain files used as part of the exff transformations. Please do not rename or delete these folders or anything in these folders. These three folder should be installed in a single "exff_r01" folder. The DOS batch files assume this. Otherwise, executing the transformations will be more difficult.

xsl

This folder contains all the XSLT transformations that make up the exff capability for Release 0.1.

dtd

This folder contains the OMG UML XMI DTDs that are required by the exff transformations. These DTDs get copied into temporary folders by the DOS batch files that execute the transformation. It also contains the express_model.dtd which controls how EXPRESS is represented in XML for exff use.

utils_samples

This folder contains the UML tool templates, the UML model examples and other files used as part of the exff capability.

This folder contains the DOS batch files you can use in Windows to execute the exff capability. These files must be edited before use!

This folder contains a file used by the e2u capability in generating a new UML XMI model file for Poseidon CE.