Interaction Flow Modeling Language

Model-Driven UI Engineering of Web and Mobile Apps with IFML

1st Edition - November 17, 2014
Authors: Marco Brambilla, Piero Fraternali
Language: English
Paperback ISBN:
9 7 8 - 0 - 1 2 - 8 0 0 1 0 8 - 0
eBook ISBN:
9 7 8 - 0 - 1 2 - 8 0 0 5 3 2 - 3

Interaction Flow Modeling Language describes how to apply model-driven techniques to the problem of designing the front end of software applications, i.e., the user interacti… Read more

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Interaction Flow Modeling Language describes how to apply model-driven techniques to the problem of designing the front end of software applications, i.e., the user interaction. The book introduces the reader to the novel OMG standard Interaction Flow Modeling Language (IFML). Authors Marco Brambilla and Piero Fraternali are authors of the IFML standard and wrote this book to explain the main concepts of the language. They effectively illustrate how IFML can be applied in practice to the specification and implementation of complex web and mobile applications, featuring rich interactive interfaces, both browser based and native, client side components and widgets, and connections to data sources, business logic components and services.

Interaction Flow Modeling Language provides you with unique insight into the benefits of engineering web and mobile applications with an agile model driven approach. Concepts are explained through intuitive examples, drawn from real-world applications. The authors accompany you in the voyage from visual specifications of requirements to design and code production. The book distills more than twenty years of practice and provides a mix of methodological principles and concrete and immediately applicable techniques.

Foreword
Chapter 1. Introduction
- 1.1. What IFML is About
- 1.2. The IFML Design Principles
- 1.3. How to Read this Book
- 1.4. On-line Resources
- 1.5. Background
- 1.6. Acknowledgment
Chapter 2. IFML in a Nutshell
- 2.1. Scope and Perspectives
- 2.2. Overview of IFML Main Concepts
- 2.3. Role of IFML in the Development Process
- 2.4. A Complete Example
- 2.5. Summary of the Chapter
- 2.6. Bibliographic Notes
Chapter 3. Domain modeling
- 3.1. Classes
- 3.2. Attributes
- 3.3. Identification and Primary Key
- 3.4. Attribute Type and Visibility
- 3.5. Operations
- 3.6. Generalization Hierarchies
- 3.7. Associations
- 3.8. N-ary Associations and Associations with Attributes
- 3.9. Derived Information and the Object Constraint Language (OCL)
- 3.10. Domain modeling patterns and practices
- 3.11. The Process of Domain Modeling
- 3.12. Running Example
- 3.13. Summary of the chapter
- 3.14. Bibliographic Notes
Chapter 4. Modeling the composition of the user interface
- 4.1. Interface Organization
- 4.2. View Container Nesting
- 4.3. View Container Navigation
- 4.4. View Container Relevance and Visibility
- 4.5. Windows
- 4.6. Context and Viewpoint
- 4.7. User Interaction Patterns
- 4.8. Interface Organization Patterns and Practices
- 4.9. Running Example
- 4.10. Summary of the Chapter
- 4.11. Bibliographic Notes
Chapter 5. Modeling interface content and navigation
- 5.1. What ViewContainers Contain: ViewComponents
- 5.2. Events and Navigation Flows with ViewComponents
- 5.3. Content Dependencies: Data Binding
- 5.4. Input-Output Dependencies: Parameter Binding
- 5.5. Extending IFML with Specialized ViewComponents and Events
- 5.6. Content and Navigation Patterns and Practices
- 5.7. Data Entry Patterns
- 5.8. Search Patterns
- 5.9. Running Example
- 5.10. Summary of the Chapter
- 5.11. Bibliographic Notes
Chapter 6. Modeling business actions
- 6.1. Actions
- 6.2. Notification
- 6.3. Business Action Patterns
- 6.4. Running Example
- 6.5. Summary of the Chapter
- 6.6. Bibliographic Notes
Chapter 7. IFML extensions
- 7.1. Desktop Extensions
- 7.2. Web Extensions
- 7.3. Mobile Extensions
- 7.4. Multiscreen Extensions
- 7.5. Summary of the Chapter
- 7.6. Bibliographic Notes
Chapter 8. Modeling patterns
- 8.1. Interface Organization
- 8.2. Navigation and Orientation
- 8.3. Content Publishing, Scrolling, and Previewing
- 8.4. Data Entry
- 8.5. Search
- 8.6. Content Management
- 8.7. Personalization, Identification, and Authorization
- 8.8. Session Data
- 8.9. Social Functions
- 8.10. GEO patterns
- 8.11. Summary of the Chapter
- 8.12. Bibliographic Notes
Chapter 9. IFML by examples
- 9.1. Media Sharing App
- 9.2. Online Auctions
- 9.3. Summary of the Chapter
Chapter 10. Implementation of applications specified with IFML
- 10.1. Implementation of the Front End for URE-HTML Page Templates
- 10.2. Implementation of the Front End for Presentation Frameworks
- 10.3. Implementation of the Front End for Rich Internet Applications
- 10.4. Implementation of the Front End for Mobile Applications
- 10.5. Summary of the Chapter
- 10.6. Bibliographic Notes
Chapter 11. Tools for model-driven development of interactive applications
- 11.1. Introduction to Webratio
- 11.2. Domain Model Design
- 11.3. IFML Front-End Design
- 11.4. Data Mapping and Alignment
- 11.5. Action Design
- 11.6. Presentation Design
- 11.7. Code Generation
- 11.8. Advanced Features
- 11.9. Summary of the Chapter
- 11.10. Bibliographic Notes
Chapter 12. IFML language design, execution, and integration
- 12.1. IFML Language Specification Through Metamodeling
- 12.2. IFML Model Execution
- 12.3. IFML Models Integration with Other System Modeling Perspectives
- 12.4. Summary of the Chapter
- 12.5. Bibliographic Notes
Appendix A. IFML notation summary
Appendix B. List of IFML design patterns
References
Index

Marco Brambilla

Marco Brambilla is full professor at Politecnico di Milano. He is active in research and innovation, both at industrial and academic level. His research interests include data science, software modeling languages and design patterns, crowdsourcing, social media monitoring, and big data analysis. He has been visiting researcher at CISCO, San Josè, and University of California, San Diego. He has been visiting professor at Dauphine University, Paris. He is founder of various startups and spinoffs, including WebRatio, Fluxedo, and Quantia, focusing on social media analysis, software modeling, Mobile and Business Process based software applications, and data science projects. He is author of various international books including Model Driven Software Development in Practice (II edizione, Morgan-Claypool, 2017, adopted in 100+ universities worldwide), Web Information Retrieval (Springer, 2013), Interaction Flow Modeling Language (Morgan-Kauffman, 2014), Designing Data-Intensive Web Applications (Morgan-Kauffman, 2002). He also authored more than 250 research articles in top research journals and conferences. He was awarded various best paper awards and gave keynotes and speeches at many conferences and organisations. He is the main author of the OMG (Object Management Group) standard IFML (Interaction Flow Modeling Language). He participated in several European and international research projects. He has been reviewer of FP7 projects and evaluator of EU FP7 proposals, as well as of national and local government funding programmes throughout Europe. He has been PC chair of ICWE 2008 and ICWE 2021, as well as co-chair of various tracks, conferences and workshops. He is associate editor of various journals and PC member of several conferences and workshops.

Affiliations and expertise

Politecnico di Milano, Milano, Italy

Piero Fraternali

Piero Fraternali has researched for twenty years on the methods and tools for improving the development of Web and multi-channel applications. He is the principal investigator of the Web Modeling Language (WebML), which inspired the IFML OMG standard, and co-founder of WebRatio, a company specialized in model-driven tools.

Affiliations and expertise

Professor of Web Technologies, Politecnico di Milano, Milano, Italy

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