Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Visual Formalisms

  • Reference work entry
  • First Online:
Encyclopedia of Database Systems

  • 26 Accesses

Definition

Visual formalisms are diagrammatic and intuitive, yet mathematically rigorous languages. Thus, despite their clear visual appearance, they come complete with a syntax that determines what is allowed, and semantics that determines what the allowed things mean. The main emphasis in the visuality is typically placed on topological relationships between diagrammatic elements, such as encapsulation, connectedness, and adjacency. Geometric and metric aspects, such as size, shape, line-style, and color, may also be part of the formalism. Icons can be used too. Such languages typically involve boxes and arrows, and are often hierarchical and modular. Visual formalisms are typically used for the design of hardware and software systems. This includes structural as well as more complex behavioral specifications.

Historical Background

Two of the oldest examples of visual formalisms are graphs and Venn diagrams, which are both originally due to Euler [7, 8]. A graph, in its most basic...

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Log in via an institution
Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 4,499.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Hardcover Book
USD 6,499.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Recommended Reading

  1. Catarci T, Costabile MF, Levialdi S, Batini C. Visual query systems for databases: a survey. J Vis Lang Comput. 1997;8(2):215–60.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  2. Chen PP-S. The entity-relationship model – toward a unified view of data. ACM Trans Database Syst. 1976;1(1):9–36.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  3. Damm W, Harel D. LSCs: breathing life into message sequence charts. J Form Methods Syst Des. 2001;19(1):45–80. Preliminary version in Ciancarini P, Fantechi A, Gorrieri R (eds). In: Proceedings of the 3rd IFIP International Conference on Formal Methods for Open Object-Based Distributed Systems; 1999. p. 293–312.

    Google Scholar 

  4. Di Battista G, Eades P, Tamassia R, Tollis IG. Graph drawing: algorithms for the visualization of graphs. Upper Saddle River: Prentice‐Hall PTR; 1998.

    MATH  Google Scholar 

  5. Edwards AWF. Cogwheels of the mind: the story of Venn diagrmas. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press; 2004.

    MATH  Google Scholar 

  6. Efroni S, Harel D, Cohen IR. Towards rigorous comprehension of biological complexity: modeling execution and visualization of thymic T cell maturation. Gen Res. 2003;13(11):2485–97.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  7. Euler L. Commentarii academiae scientiarum Petropolitanae, vol. 8. 1741.

    Google Scholar 

  8. Euler L. Lettres il une Princesse d’Allemagne, vol. 2. 1772. letters 102–108.

    Google Scholar 

  9. Fagin R. Degrees of acyclicity for hypergraphs and relational database schemes. J ACM. 1983;30(3):514–50.

    Article  MathSciNet  MATH  Google Scholar 

  10. Fagin R, Mendelzon AO, Ullman JD. A simplified universal relation assumption and its properties. ACM Trans Database Syst. 1982;7(3):343–60.

    Article  MathSciNet  MATH  Google Scholar 

  11. Fisher J, Piterman N, Hubbard EJA, Stern MJ, Harel D. Computational insights into C. elegans vulval development. Proc Natl Acad Sci. 2005;102(6):1951–6.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  12. Floyd RW. Assigning meanings to programs. In: Schwartz JT, editor. Proceedings of the Symposia on Applied Mathematics; 1967. p. 19–32.

    Google Scholar 

  13. Gane CP, Sarson T. Structured systems analysis: tools and techniques. Englewood: Prentice‐Hall; 1979.

    Google Scholar 

  14. Goldstine HH, von Neumann J. Planning and coding of problems for an electronic computing instrument. Princeton: Institute for Advanced Study; 1947. Reprinted in Taub AH, editor. von Neumann’s collected works, vol. 5. London: Pergamon; 1963, p. 80–151.

    Google Scholar 

  15. Green TRG. Pictures of programs and other processes, or how to do things with lines. Behav Inform Technol. 1982;1(1):3–36.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  16. Harel D. Statecharts: a visual formalism for complex systems. Sci Comput Program. 1987;8(3):231–74.

    Article  MathSciNet  MATH  Google Scholar 

  17. Harel D. On visual formalisms. Commun ACM. 1988;31(5):514–30.

    Article  MathSciNet  Google Scholar 

  18. Harel D, Gery E. Executable object modeling with statecharts. Computer. 1997;30(7): 31–42.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  19. Harel D, Marelly R. Come, let’s play: scenario-based programming using LSCs and the play-engine. Berlin: Springer; 2003.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  20. ITU. ITU-T recommendation Z.100: specification and description language. Technical report, International Telecommunication Union. 1992.

    Google Scholar 

  21. ITU. ITU-T recommendation Z.120: message sequence charts. Technical report, International Telecommunication Union. 1996.

    Google Scholar 

  22. Kent S. Constraint diagrams: visualizing invariants in object-oriented models. In: Proceedings of the 12th the ACM SIGPLAN Conference on Object-Oriented Programming Systems, Languages & Applications; 1997. p. 327–41.

    Google Scholar 

  23. Object Management Group (OMG). UML: unified modeling language. Available at: http://www.omg.org

  24. Reisig W. Petri nets: an introduction, monographs in theoretical computer science, An EATCS series, vol. 4. Berlin: Springer; 1885.

    Google Scholar 

  25. Venn J. Symbolic logic. London: Macmillan; 1881.

    Book  MATH  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. The Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot, Israel

    David Harel & Shahar Maoz

Authors
  1. David Harel
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Shahar Maoz
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to David Harel .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Georgia Institute of Technology College of Computing, Atlanta, GA, USA

    Ling Liu

  2. University of Waterloo School of Computer Science, Waterloo, ON, Canada

    M. Tamer Özsu

Section Editor information

  1. Dept. di Ingegneria Informatica, Automatica e Gestionale, Universita di Roma, Roma, 185, Italy

    Tiziana Catarci

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2018 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature

About this entry

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this entry

Harel, D., Maoz, S. (2018). Visual Formalisms. In: Liu, L., Özsu, M.T. (eds) Encyclopedia of Database Systems. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-8265-9_444

Download citation

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation