The deployment diagram is an element that will model hardware that is used during the system implementation. It will also be responsible for modeling the components which make up the hardware. The deployment diagram must also deal with the associations that occur among various elements.

The key structures that make up deployment diagrams are nodes, which will be shown visually as cubes. The components of the deployment diagram will also be shown in the form of rectangles, and associations are included as well. The rectangles may also have twin rectangular boxes coming out of one side. It must be noted that components won't be placed in nodes in UML 2.0.

Instead of placing components in nodes, the artifacts will be placed in nodes in UML 2.0. An artifact can be defined as a file, library, or data that is modified within a project. The artifacts will be responsible for the implementation of component collections. The internal nodes will need to deal with execution environments instead of use hardware. Some examples of these execution environments include operating systems or language interpreters.

The object diagram is an element that showcases a portion of the structure of a system that has been modeled. It is designed to do this at specific times. The object diagram will often be closely related to both attributes and object instances, a well as the links between these instances.

A correlated group of object diagrams will provide the insight for how a system will evolve over time. When compared to class diagrams, object diagrams are much more concrete. They are frequently used to provide examples, and they may also be used to to test various cases for class diagrams. An object diagram is best used in situations where the user only needs to view aspects of the model which are the most important. Another element which is closely related to object diagrams is the InstanceSpecification.

The InstanceSpecification is used to symbolize the objects and links of an object diagram. It can show the classifier of the object, and it can also show the instance name as well. This will be done by using slots, and one slot will be used to represent one feature.

The package diagram is an element which will define how the system is broken up into groupings. It will do this by showing the dependencies that exist within these groups. Because the package is commonly thought of as a directory, the package diagram will act as a hierarchy breakdown of the system.

The package will be organized in a way that will allow it to max out the inner coherence of the individual package. In addition to this, it will also reduce the outer coupling for the packages. Once all these guidelines are set into place, the packages will be ideal for management.

First Page: UML Elements : Class Diagram