Behavioral models are models of the dynamic behavior of a system as it is executing. They show what happens or what is supposed to happen when a system responds to a stimulus from its environment. Two types of stimuli:
• Some data arrives that has to be processed by the system.
• Some event happens that triggers system processing. Events may have associated data, although this is not always the case.
Many business systems are data-processing systems that are primarily driven by data. They are controlled by the data input to the system, with relatively little external event processing. Data-driven models show the sequence of actions involved in processing input data and generating an associated output. They are particularly useful during the analysis of requirements as they can be used to show end-to-end processing in a system. Data-driven models can be created using UML activity diagrams:
Data-driven models can also be created using UML sequence diagrams:
