Dynamic Viewpoints

Purpose

Use this view of concepts and their relationships to the respective neighboring concepts which are relevant for certain stakeholders to make it easier for stakeholders to read the viewpoint.

Dynamic viewpoints are dynamic concept diagrams which focus on certain detail aspects of the entire architecture. They make it easier to create and update viewpoints based on a start or context elements and existing relationships configured for the concrete dynamic viewpoint.

The Dynamic Concept Diagram diagram type is a specialization of the Concept Diagram diagram type. The full function scope of the concept diagram is available for the dynamic concept diagram. The dynamic diagram has the additional Start Elements, Path Length and Ignored Nodes properties.

Prerequisites

A start concept which is linked with the neighboring concepts using at least one of the relationships configured for the dynamic viewpoint is a prerequisite when creating a dynamic viewpoint. The configured relationships are the basis for the respective traceable path length.

A concept must be configured as a start element before it can be used as a start concept. The Use As Start Element property must be activated in the dialog for a start element in the configuration's diagram content with selected permissible meta relationship. Suitable concepts are configured accordingly in all dynamic viewpoints.

This setting has two effects:

• A dynamic concept diagram with this concept can be created as a start element in the model editor for a selected concept in the context menu. The diagram then contains the name of the start element; this is automatically made unique, if required.

• These configured concepts can be set as start elements in the Properties tool window with the Add to start elements context menu command in an existing dynamic concept diagram.

In both cases, a start element is automatically added as a node in the diagram. Start element names are always shown in bold.

Context

You can display and ensure completeness of potential relevant elements and make sure they adhere to the path length. You can show information about nodes which are not currently shown and those which do not adhere to the current path length via Design>Display>Context. Ignored nodes are shown as properties in the diagram.

Information about what changes would need to be made to these nodes can be found in the diagram's header. Superfluous nodes based on the path length are marked with a smart icon in the diagram.

Completeness is calculated starting from the start elements set to the current set path length when the diagram is opened and refreshed. If a calculated element does not yet exist in the diagram, then it can be added or ignored via a dialog. Diagram content outside of the path length can be removed via a dialog.

The ignored nodes are not taken into consideration when calculating the paths for adding or removing nodes. This avoids e.g. a reachable grouping evaluating all relevant links, thereby losing the actual focus of the diagram.

You can align elements in a dynamic concept diagram by selecting a layout ( Tree,  Star or  Layer) under  Design>Arrange>Standard Layout.

When creating a new dynamic viewpoint, the nodes which can be reached are added to the diagram, starting from the start elements. If a nesting can be expressed when concept connections are automatically shown, then this nesting will automatically occur. Automatic nesting does not occur for viewpoints with the Layer layout as display option; this is because layer-wise display would be too greatly affected by this. It is possible to explicitly carry out nesting for content, if required.

Concept diagrams and dynamic concept diagrams can be transformed within one another via Start>Organize>Change Element Type. The current diagram content is not modified.

How to proceed

Complete the following steps to achieve a focused view of the relationships:

• Create a dynamic viewpoint, starting from a suitable start concept, if required.

• Use the path length to set the maximum range of the context in the dynamic viewpoint step-by-step and add the respective relevant concepts in the Add Elements dialog.

• At the same time, set the elements which should be ignored in the future when calculating completeness of this viewpoint in the Add Elements dialog so that the focus of the viewpoint is not lost.

• Select a suitable layout for the dynamic viewpoint.