Component dialog box

Components

A component represents a modular part of a system that encapsulates its contents, and whose manifestation can be replaced within its environment.

A component defines its behavior in terms of provided and required interfaces.

The "Component" dialog box contains four tabs - "Properties", "Notes", "Tagged values" and "Stereotypes". For information on these standard dialog box tabs, please see "Standard dialog box tabs".

The "Properties" tab of the "Component" dialog box

The "Properties" tab of the "Component" dialog box is used to define values for a component.

The "Properties" tab of the "Component" dialog box

Key:

· "Name": This indicates the name of the component.

· "Abstract": An abstract component is defined very generally, and does not own direct instances.

· "Primitive": This determines if the component is primitive. A component is primitive if its value is not de-composable, and if its instances are not managed by the application. For example, "integer" and "boolean" are primitive components, whereas "Human" or "peripheral" generally are not.

· "Leaf": This indicates if the component is a leaf component (a generalizable component with no children in the generalization hierarchy) or not.

· "Main": A main component is a component whose unique instance represents the application.

· "Root': This indicates if the component is a root component (with no ancestors) or not.

· "Active": This indicates if the component is an active component (a component whose instances are active objects) or not.

· "Visibility": This only applies if a component belongs to a leaf package. The visibility can either be public or protected. A public component is accessible from any user package of the current package. A private component can only be accessed from the current package or by an heir package.