Architecture-based simulation for system evaluation

It is almost impossible to maintain the logical correctness of the architectural model of a complex system (e.g., a System of Systems). Consequently, system engineers need a rigorous formal methodology to evaluate the logical behavior of the architecture under design to guarantee its adherence to the original behavioral requirements. Currently system architects mainly rely on modeling languages such as the Unified Modeling Language (UML), the System Modeling Language (SysML), and many others. Despite their powerful features, these languages only provide a static view of the structure and behavior of the system. However, there exist methodologies to convert models expressed in architecture description languages to formal mathematical languages such as Colored Petri Nets (CPN). This conversion to a formal model enables the evaluation of an architecture's logical behavior as well as its performance and effectiveness. In this paper, a methodology is presented for evaluating a system's logical architecture using simulation and analysis tools. The Federal Aviation Administration's (FAA) Enterprise Architecture (EA) is used as a real-world illustrative example. The designs, expressed in UML and CPN, are tested for potential deadlocks and reachability properties using Computational Tree Logic (CTL) for State Space Analysis (SSA). The results of the evaluations could be used to further enhance the architecture under development.