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A use case represents a unit of the functionality specification of a system. Industrial object-oriented projects have applied use cases to capture user requirements. Use cases can be used throughout the whole process of object-oriented software development [14]. But, the problem of how to write use cases is still puzzling even software experts [6]. It reflects the lack of a systematic approach to capturing use cases. The set of use cases in a use case model is unstructured regarding the structure of the problem addressed by an application. This paper presents a notion of a use case pattern and proposes using a use case pattern to guide use case capturing. A use case pattern encodes reusable knowledge on the structure and function of a specific class of applications. It guides the work of use case gathering. We illustrate the approach to use case modeling with several use case patterns.

This paper proposes a transformation-based method to automatically generate functional test cases from use cases named USLTG (Use case Specification Language (USL)-based Test Generation). We first focus on developing a modeling language named Test Case Specification Language (TCSL) in order to express test cases. Test cases in TCSL can contain detailed information including test steps, test objects within steps, actions of test objects, and test data. Such information is often ignored in currently available test case specifications. We then aim to generate test cases in a TCSL model by a transformation from use cases that are represented by a USL. The USLTG transformation includes three main steps in generating (1) scenarios, (2) test data, and (3) a TCSL model. Within our transformation, the OCL solver is employed in order to build system snapshots as the part of test cases and to identify other test data. We applied our method to two case studies and evaluated our method by comparing it with other recent works.

The software engineering and human factors communities are seeking ways to integrate their methodologies. This paper outlines an amplified, software engineering methodology that extends beyond requirements gathering to encompass human factors analyses. The methodology employs an object model that is uniform throughout the software project. It involves a procedure that seamlessly transforms a task action grammar model, from HCI theory, directly into a specification model based on user/machine dialog and, thence, into a software design model. The model's object-oriented structure makes it feasible to trace the effects of the user's needs throughout the amplified project life cycle to the final code. A case study documents evidence concerning how effectively the procedure supports the software engineering process. An examination of the extent of metamorphosis the model undergoes in the case study indicates that the transition through the amplified life history is well controlled; in particular, the transition from the software specification to the design model is more controlled than that under traditional methodologies.