Method for validating a graphical workflow translation

• US 20080216058A1
• Filed: 02/28/2008
• Published: 09/04/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 03/02/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Siemens AG
• Original Assignee: Siemens AG
• Inventors: Solimano, Marco
• Granted Patent: US 8,490,069 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 717/128
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 11/3664 Environments for testing or debugging software

Abstract

A method for validating a translation of a graphical workflow of activities into an arbitrary, but structured language uses as input a term of a high level graphically expressed language having a number of graphical elements related logically to each other and analyzes its content and/or structure in order to translate this content and/or structure into a structured set of instructions. The graphical workflow of activities is simulated to arrive at a first set of activity results. Each instruction is translated into a generic language in order to trace the execution of such instruction to arrive at a second set of results from the translated instructions. The first set of activity results is compared with the second set of results, and the translation is validated in case of a match among the first set of activity results and the second set of results.

Claims

1. A method for validating a translation of a graphical workflow of activities into an arbitrary, but structured language, comprising:

using as input a term of a high level graphically expressed language comprising a number of graphical elements related logically to each other;

analyzing at least one of content and structure of the term in order to translate the at least one of content and structure into a structured set of instructions;

emulating the graphical workflow of activities to arrive at a first set of activity results;

translating each instruction into a generic language in order to trace execution of such instruction to arrive at a second set of results from the translated instructions; and

comparing the first set of activity results with the second set of results and validating the translation in case of a match among the first set of activity results and the second set of results.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein a structural analyzer analyzes and translates the terms of the high level graphically expressed language in terms of at least one of graphically expressed content and graphically expressed connections into the respective structured set of instructions.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein after recognizing the content and the structure of the graphical workflow, the structural analyzer uses a translation dictionary to derive at the structured set of instructions.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein each instruction is an action block tracing its input and output arguments.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the instruction is translated into a conditional block to which both a FALSE status and a TRUE status is assigned.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the first set of activity results and the second set of results is an execution path list of the logical sequence of the graphical workflow and of the action blocks respectively.