Maintaining the Consistency of SysML Model Exports to XML Metadata Interchange (XMI)

The System Modeling Language (SysML) is a visual modeling language that can be used to describe the structure and behavior of a system. Modeling tools can be used to capture the variety of diagrams and maintain the consistency of elements across the different structural and behavioral representations of the system. Current research is investigating using the XML Metadata Interchange (XMI) standard to convert the diagrammatic information captured in SysML into a format that can be used to produce software code that can then be simulated to ensure conformance with system requirements. The XMI standard can be used as an interim format to migrate the content from a diagrammatic representation, where system elements are sorted by the diagram that contains them, to an object approach, where all elements related to an entity reside in a tree structure below that element. This paper presents a method to ensure the consistency of the XMI representation regardless of whether a functional or physical system engineering approach is used for the design process. This has implications in maintaining the consistency of the XMI file when system development is initiated from a high level of abstraction, followed by iterative addition of detail. The goal is to ensure that XMI file maintains an authoritative representation of the modeled system.