System Modeler in Agile Business Suite Developer takes advantage of the Visual Studio functionality and interfaces to enable you to work with your application. It uses a combination of common Visual Studio and Developer specific windows and views.
System Modeler models an application at the logical level. It enables you to:
Focus efforts on describing the application behavior rather than details of implementation.
Bring applications forward from one generation of technology to another, or from one platform to another, over the life of your application.
With this model System Modeler merges the best of the mainstream object and component concepts, including COM and UML, to provide a powerful development environment.
For users with existing applications this provides many benefits, without the need to perform extensive rework:
Greater modularity:
Definitions can be more localized.
Definitions can be protected by encapsulation within well-defined interfaces.
Improved simplicity:
Uniform patterns applied to everything.
Fewer special cases and rules to remember.
New users benefit from System Modeler’s high level model and business constructs to create more robust business components more quickly.
The model allows users to describe a change to the model as directly as possible, requiring the model to make whatever other consequential changes are required. For example, an ispec becomes output or IO if it has persistent attributes, rather than having to specify its kind and that of its attributes separately, and making sure they are compatible.
The model is stored in a transactional database, so that its integrity is protected and it can safely be shared between developers. Unlike 3GLs whose models are captured in text files, errors are actively prevented rather than having to be identified later.