UML 2.0 Activity Diagrams

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Welcome to my tutorial on UML 2.0 Activity Diagrams! In this tutorial, I'll show you all of the symbols used to create activity diagrams.

Activity diagrams show what actions occur step-by-step to achieve a given goal. Activity symbols are very similar to flowchart notation, so you should find this topic very easy to learn.

I have the entire image I taught from on my site. I think it will be a great cheat sheet. The program I use is UMLet. It is free and works on all OSs.

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[derekbanas]

I will never understand why universities don't spend more time on courses that directly relate to the degree instead of unrelated courses?

[TheSkeptic]

A ForkNode is *not* represented as a diamond as specified around 3:20. It is represented as a line-segment, it can be either a horizontal or vertical, as specified in the UML 2.5 SuperStructure specification in Figure 15.29. From UML SuperStructure 2.5 section 15.3.4:

" The notation for both ForkNodes and JoinNodes is simply a line segment, as illustrated on the left side of Figure 15.29 (not necessarily in that orientation).When used, however, a ForkNode must have a single incoming ActivityEdge and usually has two or more outgoing ActivityEdges, while a JoinNode usually has two or more incoming ActivityEdges and must have a single outgoing ActivityEdge."

[Miguel-ngwm]

What I've learned is that NO MATTER WHAT the freaking UML diagram is wrong. According to my fucking SE professor.

[derekbanas]

I can't imagine finishing a big project without sequence diagrams. It does seem like more organizations I have dealt with lately are trying to work with just simple usage descriptions. I just go and make my sequence diagrams on my own. Magically I continue to finish my projects while others have been failing at an increasing rate. I get the Ed Helms thing all the time :)

[derekbanas]

I'm glad you enjoy them. I don't think about negative comments. Actually some of them help me improve my videos :)

[derekbanas]

Thank you :) I do my best to fill in the gaps. It is amazing to me that colleges don't teach this topic. When I first started working for Apple it was a must that I understood Object Oriented Design and how to use UML diagrams.

[derekbanas]

Thank you :) This is technically a Java tutorial as it is a tutorial for all languages. I had to teach UML so I could dive into the complexity that is OO analysis. Then I'll dive in head first for refactoring. After that everything is easy

[MrHvfan]

Derek, I keep shying away from using UML notation, since I keep ending up with hybrid diagrams. Your videos have really helped to clear things up. Many thanks and greatly appreciated.

[derekbanas]

What I'm showing here are the standardized rules for many UML diagrams. In the real world you will sometimes leave out explanations in the simple part of your system, while you'll explain beyond the standard when needed. As this series continues I demonstrate that because I create very detailed sequence diagrams

[derekbanas]

Thank you very much :) So far the voting is going the Game / Android route but that could change. I may be able to slip in Hibernate or Spring? What are you looking for? Either way I'll cover J2EE after the other tutorial. This is just a vote on which is covered next. It isn't an either or vote

[PeterKelley]

I'm looking at these videos for possible use by developers in my company and I noticed something at about 2:40 that I'm not sure is right. Here a diamond is being used to execute activities in parallel however my understanding of the semantics of activity diagrams is that a diamond only produces one "activation token" and so only one of those activities can be executed. Normally there would be guard conditions coming out of the diamond to determine which path is picked. The correct notation for what you are describing would be a solid line which generates multiple activation tokens on exit. The merge should also be a solid line as execution continues when all inputs have triggered. The way you have it execution will continue after only one activity completes.

[derekbanas]

Thank you :) I do my best to make learning easy. I'm glad you liked the videos

[derekbanas]

Hello, I use UMLet. It works on every OS and can either be used as an Eclipse plugin, or on its own. Visual Paradigm is the best in my opinion, but it is also expensive. Most of the time for tutorials and in the real world I use a paper and pencil, or a white board.

[rodrigo]

I think the ones who disliked this video are the ones who make videos themselves but got jealous of Derek's videos haha. I just started learning UML Diagrams yesterday and I already learned so much in only two videos.

[NicoleBraybrook]

Honestly, what would I do without you?!?

[derekbanas]

You're very welcome :) I'm glad I could help

[derekbanas]

In this tutorial I'm using UMLet because it is free and identical on every OS. In the real world I use a paper and pencil or a whiteboard.

[invinciblekd]

This tutorials were what I was always looking for !! Thanks a lot Derek, Coding is not much a big problem for me but I always struggled when I was asked to develop something from scratch, a lot of back and forth development cycles messes the whole project. Now I know how to proceed for new projects from scratch !

[derekbanas]

I've never been into the uml tools that translate into code. I didn't find them useful and also they are extremely expensive. What tool are you using?

[derekbanas]

Eventually you'll find a few diagram tools that work best for you and then use them. I normally write a use case description and then a sequence diagram and that is it. Check out part 1 of my object oriented design tutorial to see what I use in the real world