Executable architecture modeling and validation

Department of Defense Architecture Framework (DoDAF) as a common integrated system architecture specification has already gained the widespread acceptance in the world. However, the limitations of its static descriptive form render it unable to support the further analysis for the dynamic behaves of complex integrated system. Therefore, an executable model is needed to fulfill the requirement of analysis, validation and evaluation. Aimed at creating an executable model that has complete bi-directional traceability between the static representations and the dynamic properties, a four-dimension modeling approach based on Meta Model Mapping (M³) is developed to support the derivation of a Hierarchical Colored Petri Nets (HCPN) model that can reveal the logical and behavioral characteristics of the system architecture from a set of DoDAF products. The semantic corresponding relations between DoDAF state transition description and HCPN occurrence graph are also explored, which is served as the basis of the model validation.