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This paper describes the results achieved through an integrated assignment performed during the 2nd semester of 2019 in the undergraduate course of Fashion Design at the State University of Londrina (UEL, in the Portuguese acronym), whose pedagogical project is grounded on the Project-Based Learning (PjBL) and on an interdisciplinary approach.Conducted with the first-year students, this study intends to analyze the pedagogical efforts performed to promote the development of their ability with the formal syntax in fashion design and the garment pattern making as parts that combine to build the project thinking. In order to do so, we applied a methodological approach based on a collection of imagery boards and the organization of the MODThink model (EMÍDIO, 2018).

Empirical research suggests that programming language syntax is a common impediment for beginners, a concern that is mitigated to a varying degree by visual programming. In this paper, we introduce a novel visual programming language that is founded on program synthesis and the programming-by-demonstration paradigm. By using an intuitive visual syntax, we show how we can meet our primary goal of providing support to computer programming novices in exploring foundational programming concepts. We present the language's current and planned use in computer science education, provide preliminary evidence for its effectiveness, and discuss its future possibilities.

Diagrams are an integral part of our communication and thus automated processing of diagrams becomes increasingly relevant. One way to realise automated processing is by using declarative specifications of diagrams. These declarative specifications have similarities to domain knowledge modelled in ontologies. The Web Ontology Language (OWL), an open standard of W3C, is a prominent ontology language to model domain knowledge. In this paper, OWL is evaluated for its suitability to specify visual syntax of diagrams. Specifically, reviews of literature are conducted to establish relevant evaluation criteria and to obtain evidence about OWL for the established criteria. The evaluation indicates that OWL is used widely, which could be attributed to its standardisation and expressiveness, and consequently, it has extensive tool support, including reasoners and editors, with noticeable presence of open source tools. The evaluation also indicates that although OWL has been used successfully for diagram specifications, further research is required to understand entirely its strengths and limitations as a visual syntax specification technique.

O artigo enfatiza a formação da habilidade para articular a sintaxe visual/formal como via fundamental para a consolidação do pensamento projetual entre estudantes de design de moda. A partir de uma abordagem exploratória, integra dois enfoques de pesquisa: o primeiro estuda a autorregulação da aprendizagem no ensino de projeto e o segundo aborda estratégias metodológicas para o desenvolvimento da h abilidade de síntese compositiva. Nesse sentido, o recorte proposto examina as práticas dirigidas à aprendizagem de Metodologia Visual no Bacharelado em Design de Moda da Universidade Estadual de Londrina, indagando sobre as contribuições efetivas da manip ulação criativa experimental e da decomposição de enunciados visuais. Para tanto, analisa uma ação pedagógica combinada, visando à comprovação de sua eficácia didática. As inferências resultantes confirmam o potencial da referida ação e das estratégias de aprendizagem autorregulada como facilitadoras da capacidade de gerar conceitos expressivos e configurar artefatos no campo da moda.

Many programming problems call for turning geometrical thoughts into code: tables, hierarchical structures, nests of objects, trees, forests, graphs, and so on. Linear text does not do justice to such thoughts. But, it has been the dominant programming medium for the past and will remain so for the foreseeable future. This paper proposes a novel mechanism for conveniently extending textual programming languages with problem-specific visual syntax. It argues the necessity of this language feature, demonstrates the feasibility with a robust prototype, and sketches a design plan for adapting the idea to other languages.

Graph Transformation (GraTra) provides a formal, declarative means of specifying model transformation. In practice, GraTra rule applications are often programmed via an additional language with which the order of rule applications can be suitably controlled. Story-Driven Modelling (SDM) is a dialect of programmed GraTra, originally developed as part of the Fujaba CASE tool suite. Using an intuitive, UML-inspired visual syntax, SDM provides usual imperative control flow constructs such as sequences, conditionals and loops that are fairly simple, but whose interaction with individual GraTra rules is nonetheless non-trivial. In this paper, we present the first results of our ongoing work towards providing a formal step semantics for SDM, which focuses on the execution of an SDM specification., Comment: In Proceedings GaM 2016, arXiv:1612.01053

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to investigate the feasibility of creating a declarative user interface language suitable for rapid prototyping of mobile and Web apps. Moreover, this paper presents a new framework for creating responsive user interfaces using JavaScript. Design/methodology/approach – Very little existing research has been done in JavaScript-specific declarative user interface (UI) languages for mobile Web apps. This paper introduces a new framework, along with several case studies that create modern responsive designs programmatically. Findings – The fully implemented prototype verifies the feasibility of a JavaScript-based declarative user interface library. This paper demonstrates that existing solutions are unwieldy and cumbersome to dynamically create and adjust nodes within a visual syntax of program code. Originality/value – This paper presents the Guix.js platform, a declarative UI library for rapid development of Web-based mobile interfaces in JavaScript.

WebML is a domain-specific language used to design complex data-intensive Web applications at a conceptual level. As WebML was devised to support design tasks, the need to define a visual notation for the language was identified from the very beginning. Each WebML element is consequently associated with a separate graphical symbol which was mainly defined with the idea of providing simple and expressive modelling artefacts rather than by adopting a rigorous scientific approach. As a result, the graphical models defined with WebML may sometimes prevent proper communication from taking place between the various stakeholders. In fact, this is a common issue for most of the existing model-based proposals that have emerged during the last few years under the umbrella of model-driven engineering. In order to illustrate this issue and foster in using a scientific basis to design, evaluate, improve and compare visual notations, this paper analyses WebML according to a set of solid principles, based on the theoretical and empirical evidence concerning the cognitive effectiveness of visual notations. As a result, we have identified a set of possible improvements, some of which have been verified by an empirical study. Furthermore, a number of findings, experiences and lessons learnt on the assessment of visual notations are presented.

Graphical models are useful for discussing different aspects of processes, structures or requirements. The visual syntax of a standard modelling language cannot support all such aspects. There are several cases where it would be desirable to decorate the symbols in a diagram with additional visual annotations. This way, it is possible to include specific information (such as security requirements) that cannot be expressed graphically when using the standard modelling language. In our paper, we present plug-ins for the Eclipse Modelling Framework that make it possible to decorate diagrams with additional visual annotations. These plug-ins can be added to Eclipse-based modelling tools, thus allowing them to enrich the expressiveness of their diagrams.

Feature models are used to represent the variability and commonality of software product lines (SPL), and to decide on the configuration of specific applications. Several variants based on tree or graph hierarchical structures have been proposed. These structures are completed with additional constraints, generally expressed in parallel with the feature diagram. This paper proposes the use of hypergraphs to integrate both concepts in a unique characterization. Therefore, the definition, validation and selection of feature configurations can be internally based on the hypergraph properties and well-known algorithms, while the concrete visual syntax remains unchanged for domain engineers. The implemented hypergraph algorithms have been tested using a complete set of feature diagrams. Finally a feature meta-model can be derived directly from the formal definitions, providing the foundations for building feature modeling tools.

This paper introduces triggered message sequence charts (TMSCs), a graphical, mathematically well-founded framework for capturing scenario-based system requirements of distributed systems. Like message sequence charts (MSCs), TMSCs are graphical depictions of scenarios, or exchanges of messages between processes in a distributed system. Unlike MSCs, however, TMSCs are equipped with a notion of trigger that permits requirements to be made conditional, a notion of partiality indicating that a scenario may be subsequently extended, and a notion of refinement for assessing whether or not a more detailed specification correctly elaborates on a less detailed one. The TMSC notation also includes a collection of composition operators allowing structure to be introduced into scenario specifications so that interactions among different scenarios may be studied. In the first part of this paper, TMSCs are introduced and their use in support of requirements modeling is illustrated via two extended examples. The second part develops the mathematical underpinnings of the language

A close reading of recent print ads reveals current trends or themes in the recombination of signs that attempt to keep one step ahead of a media-literate audience. The signs are not new, but the r...

The visual syntax of modelling languages can support (or impede) the intuitive understandability of a model. We observed the process of problem solving with two notation variants of i* diagrams by means of an eye-tracking device. The number of wrongly answered questions was significantly lower when the alternative i* notation suggested by Moody et al. was used. For the eye-tracking metrics “time to solve a task” and “number of eye fixations”, no such significant result can be given. Furthermore, we identified a deficiency for the “dependency” symbol in the alternative notation.

We present a new ontology visualization tool, that uses Euler diagrams to represent concepts. The use of Euler diagrams as a visualisation tool allows the visual syntax to be well matched to its meaning.

In robotics we are often faced with the problem of repeatedly writing robot drivers for the same devices, but different robot frameworks. In an effort to counter this, a domain specific language for generating robot drivers was developed. However, descriptions tend to get verbose fast and the adopted syntax was difficult for programmers. This paper outlines an attempt to shift away from a textual syntax and toward a visual syntax, instead relying on the textual syntax to communicate the model to other tools. In addition, a formalism for defining ROS nodes is presented and a model transformation for mapping RDIS messages to ROS messages and vice-versa is created.

Since inexpensive computers possessing sophisticated graphics were introduced in the late 1970s, program development research has focused on syntax-directed editors that are based on the grammars of their underlying languages. The system presented here automatically generates object-oriented, syntax-directed editors for visual languages, which are described by a family of editing operations.

This chapter discusses the specification of diagrams and diagram transformations with picture logic, a visual Horn clause language. Formalisation techniques for diagrammatic languages have previously mainly been investigated for the specification of static visual syntax. For reasoning about many types of diagrams, however, a formalisation of their dynamic aspects is indispensable. This is particularly true for many diagrammatic mathematical notations, because their evaluation rules or consequence relations correspond to visual or graphical transformations. The chapter presents constraint-based extensions of picture logic which render it suitable for the specification of such diagram notations and the required transformations.

We consider the representation of a visual specification within a highly integrated environment which provides specialized support for the associated visual language. We state that such an environment needs to represent a visual specification at four levels in order to perform its tasks: (1)the physical layout,(2) the pictorial structure,(3)the abstract structure, and (4) the representation of the meaning. Furthermore, we will show how graph grammars, constraint solving, and attribute evaluation can be used to keep the representations up-to-date with each other. It will turn out that defining the structure at different levels and defining the visual syntax are in fact two names for the same thing.