Various comments on the following propreties:

dataItemRef: QName: "... A DataItem can have only one of dataItemRef or ItemDefinitionRef as a set attribute. Neither of them is required, though ..."

ERROR? - I could not find ItemDefinitionRef within DataItem; perhaps it was meant to be ItemDefinition or metaDefinitionRef; ItemDefinition does contain ItemDefinitionRef.

locationRef : Location [0..*] A list of potential Locations for the DataItem.

MISSING: this provides no idea what kind of 'location' is meant here; there are technical possibilities in the descendant types, but it doesn't tell us the semantics - is the location a source-of-truth repository where an instance of the item is maintained? Locations of copies? Something else?

preAssignment : Assignment [0..1] Specifies an optional pre-assignment DMN Expression. The expression will provide values for one or more of the simple type itemComponents of the ItemDefinition set for the DataItem.

ERROR? I could not locate 'itemComponents' in the model - probably what is meant is DMN1-3 ItemDefinition.itemComponent (singular name, multiple cardinality).

Proposed change:

ItemDefinitionRef is referenced in DataItem.dataItemRef, but doesn't exist in the model. Correction needed somewhere.

DataItem.locationRef (possibly renamed as per SDMN-4) needs to be better defined. The current definition provides no idea what kind of 'location' is meant here; there are technical possibilities in the descendant types, but it doesn't tell us the semantics - is the location a source-of-truth repository where an instance of the item is maintained? Locations of copies? Something else? Without a clearer distinction between information entities and physical ones, this might be difficult to clarify.

DataItem.preAssignment and (other properties in the model - need to do a global search) refer to 'itemComponents', which is not defined in the model. Possibly what is meant is DMN1-3 ItemDefinition.itemComponent

Defer to the RTF

Defer to the RTF

Various comments on the following propreties:

dataItemRef: QName: "... A DataItem can have only one of dataItemRef or ItemDefinitionRef as a set attribute. Neither of them is required, though ..."

ERROR? - I could not find ItemDefinitionRef within DataItem; perhaps it was meant to be ItemDefinition or metaDefinitionRef; ItemDefinition does contain ItemDefinitionRef.

locationRef : Location [0..*] A list of potential Locations for the DataItem.

MISSING: this provides no idea what kind of 'location' is meant here; there are technical possibilities in the descendant types, but it doesn't tell us the semantics - is the location a source-of-truth repository where an instance of the item is maintained? Locations of copies? Something else?

preAssignment : Assignment [0..1] Specifies an optional pre-assignment DMN Expression. The expression will provide values for one or more of the simple type itemComponents of the ItemDefinition set for the DataItem.

ERROR? I could not locate 'itemComponents' in the model - probably what is meant is DMN1-3 ItemDefinition.itemComponent (singular name, multiple cardinality).

Proposed change:

ItemDefinitionRef is referenced in DataItem.dataItemRef, but doesn't exist in the model. Correction needed somewhere.

DataItem.locationRef (possibly renamed as per SDMN-4) needs to be better defined. The current definition provides no idea what kind of 'location' is meant here; there are technical possibilities in the descendant types, but it doesn't tell us the semantics - is the location a source-of-truth repository where an instance of the item is maintained? Locations of copies? Something else? Without a clearer distinction between information entities and physical ones, this might be difficult to clarify.

DataItem.preAssignment and (other properties in the model - need to do a global search) refer to 'itemComponents', which is not defined in the model. Possibly what is meant is DMN1-3 ItemDefinition.itemComponent

SDMN ItemDefinition would seem to be a major extension of the DMN ItemDefinition class. It is documented as: "The itemDefinition element is the mechanism for providing the data structure of DataItems. It is contained within a SDMNDefinitions"

Since SDMN is intended to be a formalism for defining data models / items in a simple way (i.e. simpler than using UML), I would not expect it to contain classes that depend on anything in DMN. If DMN were being written now, I would suggest it would reference SDMN::ItemDefinition. If there are solid semantics for the split between SDMN::ItemDefinition and DMN::ItemDefinition, I would suggest they should be preserved by modelling both within SDMN, and making future versions of DMN refer to that.

The DMN form appears to model data items, rather than 'anything', which appears to be the scope of SDMN ItemDefinition. It is therefore not obvious to me that the inheritance is right. We might expect something more like:

ItemDefinition (abstract)
+--- DataItemDefinition (more or less the DMN version)
+--- XXXItemDefinition

where the XXXItemDefinition is various meta-classes representing e.g. document, class, - all the other kinds of itemKindRef, with appropriate meta-modelling attributes.

Defer to the RTF

Defer to the RTF

SDMN ItemDefinition would seem to be a major extension of the DMN ItemDefinition class. It is documented as: "The itemDefinition element is the mechanism for providing the data structure of DataItems. It is contained within a SDMNDefinitions"

Since SDMN is intended to be a formalism for defining data models / items in a simple way (i.e. simpler than using UML), I would not expect it to contain classes that depend on anything in DMN. If DMN were being written now, I would suggest it would reference SDMN::ItemDefinition. If there are solid semantics for the split between SDMN::ItemDefinition and DMN::ItemDefinition, I would suggest they should be preserved by modelling both within SDMN, and making future versions of DMN refer to that.

The DMN form appears to model data items, rather than 'anything', which appears to be the scope of SDMN ItemDefinition. It is therefore not obvious to me that the inheritance is right. We might expect something more like:

ItemDefinition (abstract)
+--- DataItemDefinition (more or less the DMN version)
+--- XXXItemDefinition

where the XXXItemDefinition is various meta-classes representing e.g. document, class, - all the other kinds of itemKindRef, with appropriate meta-modelling attributes.

to be MOF compliant.

Added Labels for all SCE Metamodel Relationships

The labels have been added. This will be resolved when the xmi is exported. But that will be done when all the other metamodel changes have been made at the end of the FTF.
These labels will not affect any diagram in the spec.

As part of Issue 2/51 we reset the Connector element to SCEElement instead of ElementRelationshipType (which inherits from ElementType).
In our discussions we agreed to reset all relevant SDMN Elements to SCEElement.

Refactor all SDMN Elements to inherit from SCEElement

As part of Issue 2/51 we reset the Connector element to SCEElement instead of ElementRelationshipType (which inherits from ElementType).
In our discussions we agreed to reset all relevant SDMN Elements to SCEElement.

Elements that need to be changed (not including the Connector element that was changed for SDMN-2/SDMN-51 or the removal of DataState, ItemFormat, and Location):
DataItem
Assignment

Proposed change

The possible values of MultiplicityKind can be (and are) exhaustively definable. It would be more easily expressed as an enum type, and its use elsewhere in the model should be replaced by that enum type.

Change MultiplicityKinds into an Enumerated Set and Review the types of that set

Change MulitplicityKinds into an Enumerated Set, instead of a vocabulary list, and Review the types of that set.

Also, remove Section 12.2 - MultiplicityKind - from the Vocabularies section. Since ItemKind is also being removed by SDMN-99, delete Section 12 - SDMN Library - completely
Replace Section 10.2.3 - MultiplicityKind - with the definition of the enumerated list instead of the vocabulary

SDMN should remain a logical data model. Associating terms to ontologies is of the realm of conceptual models and is already better served by SBVR.

Remove Vocabularies from SDMN

Based on changes to ItemKind and MultiplicityKind (reducing to string properties), the Vocabulary capability is no longer needed in SDMN. Thus, the sections and any references to Vocabulary will be removed.

It has unnamed Associations and Properties which are not permitted

This issue is resolved by Issue SDMN-38

The addition of association names through SDMN-38 will resolve this issue

Since SDMN does not require additional properties on any DI elements, it can just re-use the DI classes provided by SCE by SCE-53

Re-use SCE DI classes without subclassing them

Delete SDMNDI from the spec, metamodels, and xsds.

(SCE doc) 6.6 Structure of this Document

Fix unresolved reference in Section 6.6

In section 6.6: replace
see the section entitled “Error! Reference source not found.”
with
see the section entitled "Overview"
This is a cross reference in the document.
Also, see Ballot 4 convenience document: tbd...
There are no schema changes for this issue

Need discussion of how to deal with different DMN Versions.

Update the way DMN is referenced in the spec

Update the way DMN is referenced in the spec to allow for vendors to use the most recent version of DMN (that is backwards compatible).

The definition of this property says:
This attribute was added because ItemDefinition is based on the DMN ItemDefinition, which is not based on the SCE specification and thus, does not have a built in SemanticReference as
part of its definition.

Refer to comments in https://issues.omg.org/issues/SDMN-6

Proposed change:
It is suggested to make the SDMN definition of ItemDefinition either standalone or incorporate a copy of the DMN form, if it truly fits (but this is debatable; see SDMN-6).

The property mentioned in this issue would then no longer be needed.

Update ItemDefinition SemanticReference to conceptReference

This issue is dependent on SCE changes.

SCE-2 adds expressionLanguage and typeLanguage properties. Therefor, these properties can be removed from SDMN.

Remove redundant expressionLanguage and typeLanguage

The expressionLanguage and typeLanguage attributes are removed since they are in SCE and thus inherited by SDMN. These properties are in the SDMNModelPackage.

The definition and visualization of a Composition Connector should be aligned with that of UML

With Data Item Modeling this issue can be closed

Based on discussions: We agreed that both Data Item and Item Definition modeling are needed in SDMN. In that case this issue is no longer needed.

I am not convinced that SDMN DataItems need to cover entity types so broad as Conceptual, Document, Folder, Physical, UMLClass, XSDComplexType and so on. I suggest that in an SDMN model, any technical data definition type - at least DataType, XSDComplexType, WSDLMessage, XSDElement, XSDSimpleType - should just be represented in SDMN as a technical DataType metatype.

With respect to other item types:

• Conceptual - documented as representing non-physical / mental entity; if the intention is to represent something that can at least be named, e.g. a CPG name or id, then this should be covered by a Data Type capable of carrying such a name or reference.
• Document - either this is a reference to a document, in which case it is just a DataType capable of carrying an identifier, or else it is to do with the content, in which case, it is a complex DataType representing the document content; the variable definitions of Document in BMPN versus CMMN might be problematic here.
• Folder - this is a CMMN Case File Item, according to the documentation; can this not be captured by an appropriate kind of URI or other identifier?
• Physical - a reference to a physical BPMN entity, location etc; from an abstract SDMN model definition perspective, this could presumably be carried in a suitable data item for which a Datatype instance will be constructed;
• UMLClass - it is unclear how this can be an SDMN DataItem - more explanation would be useful.
• Unknown/Unspecified - documented as a CMMN Unknown/Unspecified type; would it not be better to include type unknown-ness or optionality within the SDMN meta-model rather than make it a kind of DataItem?

I would suggest that SDMN would make more sense as a slimmed down UML static model formalism, with some extras to do with data quality and currency.

Change ItemKinds into an Enumerated Set and Review the types of that set

The ItemKind property, not a class, and should be a string.
We will list in the spec a table of the default items.
There would be a mapping to the other specs (e.g., BPMN).
Vendors can then extend the list if they want to.

Also, remove Section 12.1 - ItemKind - from the Vocabularies section.
Replace Section 10.2.2 - ItemKind - with the definition of the enumerated list instead of the vocabulary

Class description:
DataItems can optionally reference a DataState element, which is the state of the data contained in the DataItem.
The definition of these DataStates, e.g., possible values and any specific semantic are out of scope of this
specification. Therefore, SDMN adopters can use the DataState element and the SDMN extensibility capabilities to
define their DataStates.

It is not clear what kind of 'states' are intended here. Is the intention that users of SDMN invent their own local lifecycle models for certain kinds of data? Since an SDMN DataItem can be literally anything, from a single Quantity to an entire document, such lifecycles could widely vary, and it is not clear that they would even apply to many kinds of DataItem.

Proposed change:

Suggest the description of DataItem.dataStateRef be improved, possibly with some examples.

If the intention really is to support lifecycle states (e.g. of a document, from draft to approved, or similar) then a more comprehensive facility including a state machine or at least a set of possible states (perhaps in some DataStateType class or vocabulary) would seem to be better, since it is likely to lead to more interoperable SDMN instances.

Remove DataState from SDMN

Remove DataState from SDMN

DataAssociation is a Connector type documented as:

The DataAssociation class is a Connector and used to model how data is mapped between two DataItems. The source of the association is mapped to the target.

The word 'association' tends to imply a UML association, i.e. the alternative to Composition.

Additionally, a data mapping is often not 1:1, as implied by this model, which possibly indicates that it is not a Connector, but a mapping that may associate 1:N or N:N other items, with an algorithm to define the transformation.

Further, the arrow type is not very evocative of the idea of mapping - and also not easily distinguishable from the Reference Connector arrow type.

Proposed change
Suggest a better name for DataAssociation class would be DataMapping or similar.

Consider whether this class really is a Connector type, or should be understood as its own relationship.

Improve the symbol to be more evocative of the idea of mapping.

DataAssociation has been determined to be a Connector and will remain in SDMN.

DataAssociation has been determined to be a Connector and will remain in SDMN.

The first sentence in the section lists the SCE Diagram shapes, not the SDMN Diagram shapes.

Fix first section in section

In Section 16.3.5.2, first sentence of section, replace "Text Annotation or a Group" with "Data Item"

Firstly I would expect to see Locations in the Party model, and shared by all other BPM+ specs. This is probably intended; just noting it here.

The documentation of Location is:
Location is an abstract class where its concrete specializations identify a particular place or position. Locations are contained within a SDMNPackage and can be referenced by DataItems.

Better wording of the first sentence:
Location is an abstract class whose concrete specializations identify a particular place or position.

Semantically, it should possibly say 'a particular addressable place ...', since this part of the model is about locations that can be identified by address. There arguably should be a derived attribute, function or even data property to carry such an address. If derived, it would be a stringified form of a structural address.

Addresses are likely to take different structural forms, e.g. street address, geo-spatial (lat/long) address, cadastral map references and so on.

There is a sub-type for NetworkAddress, which is not a 'location' in the physical sense. I would call it a kind of address rather than a kind of location.

On the other hand, GeoSpatialExtent is documented as: A location that is a volume in the world such as a container or a room. This is arguably a kind of location - although perhaps an object - presumably movable - is also intended. It is not clear how it is addressed. If movable things are intended, then the 'address' is some sort of identifier of the container, e.g. truck, plane, test-tube in a lab etc.

A useful resource for thinking about some of these types is BFO2.0, which can be found here: http://gbadske.org/Files/BFO2-Reference.pdf - see p3 for the is-a hierarchy.

Another reference is how we do this in openEHR, which separates 'place' from 'address'. See https://specifications.openehr.org/releases/UML/latest/index.html#Diagrams___19_0_3_8fe028d_1648920292880_630012_5562

Proposed Change:

The Locations part of the model needs to be adjusted to correctly distinguish between 'places' and 'addresses', and also between physical and informational entities. It appears that the real need of the model is to be able to form references to any kind of entity.

It might therefore be clearer to change DataItem.locationRef to DataItem.locator, meaning a reference that can be resolved to find the target entity. The Location class could also be renamed to Locator, and the subtypes could be as follows:

* PhysicalLocator
    * SpatialLocator - locators for entities fixed in space
        * PlaceAddress, meaning a building, site, home etc address
        * GeospatialLocator, meaning lat/long, possibly altitude as well 
        * possibly type(s) for any other common types of map / cadastral reference
    * ObjectLocator: locator for movable objects
* DataLocator, meaning a (probably) URI resolvable to obtain a data item

The type SpaceTime is not a Locator as such, it just adds a time period, presumably to indicate validity. It would be better to remove this type and add the two attributes startTime and endTiime as optional attributes in Locator.

Properties in other classes that are currently named 'locationRef' could potentially be renamed 'locator'.

Remove Location from SDMN

Remove Location from SDMN

In the detailed description of both these types is the following (bullets 3 & 4):

• If element within a folder-type DataItem container is updated (e.g., through a change in the value of a

property), the container will not be updated. I.e., the container is not aware of changes to existing contained
DataItems.

• If DataItem within a non-folder-type DataItem container is updated (e.g., through a change in the value of

a property), the container will also be updated. I.e., the container is aware of changes to contained
DataItems.

This seems just to be saying that Folder 'containment' of other items is not really containment, such that the containing object is not considered to be changed when a sub-part is. This is contrary to the very idea of containment, and likely indicates that Folder 'containment' should really just be referencing. If a 'Folder' is deleted for example, are all the items within it deleted? If so, this indicates that a Folder is not a reference object but a true container, and the above special logic is not needed.

My suspicion is that the semantics of Folders is not that clear in SDMN, and knowing what SDMN's primary purpose is, it it not clear that Folder is even needed there - it seems just to be some kind of document-organising concept in CMMN. It might simplify SDMN significantly to get rid of it.

Proposed change:
At least the documentation of Folder needs to be improved to make the semantics clear OR perform analysis to determine if it can be removed from SDMN altogether.

This issue is being resolved by Issue 10/68

Issue 10/68 resolves the confusion between containers and composition.
We also determined that the Folder should remain in SDMN.

Description of CompositionConnector:

A CompositionConnector is used to define a relationship between DataItems. This relationship will specify that

one DataItem is contained within another DataItem. This relationship supports the composition of DataItems.

Description of ContainmentConnector:

A ContainmentConnector is used to define a relationship between DataItems. This relationship will specify that

one DataItem is contained within another DataItem. This relationship supports the containment of DataItems,
including the parent and child association that exists between CMMN CaseFileItems.

These are effectively the same and are aiming to replicate the UML composition relationship. The detailed description given in four bullet points for each class is also the same.

The ContainmentConnector type seems to add needless complexity, possibly to accommodate some slight difference in CMMN data object semantics? If so, this should be abstracted away in SDMN, and dealt with in some SDMN / CMMN binding layer.

Proposed change:
Either:

• If the semantics of Composition and Containment are truly different, then make it clear how in the documentation.
  Or:
• Remove ContainmentConnector from the model.

Clarify the difference between containment and composition in the spec

The descriptive text in the spec did not clarify the differences between containment and composition.
This proposal made changes to the text as clarifications.
The two connectors are different and will both remain as part of SDMN.

See previous issues.

If CompositionConnector and ContainmentConnector were collapsed to just one type, and DataAssociation was modelled as a complex N:N relationship, and ReferenceConnector considered the equivalent of a UML association (call it AssociationConnector), then we would just have:

• CompositionConnector
• AssociationConnector

as descendants of Connector.

This simplification would imply that the subtyping approach could be removed altogether, and Connector be a concrete type with a boolean such as isComposition to indicate that it is a Composition; if False, it is an association.

The class currently called DataAssociation could be modelled as a new class Mapping, probably just inheriting from SCEElement, with multiple source items and one target i.e. an N:1 mapping, plus a transformation function taking the N source items as arguments.

No changes to the Connectors for SDMN

Based on discussion from other issues, we will be retaining the composition and container connectors (with better documentation) and will retain the DataAssociation. Thus, this issue can be closed.

The Data item folder shape collides with CMMN notation. It should be used.

Replace the Data Item (Folder) shape so that it does not collide with CMMN shape

This affects :
Figure 14: DataItem Object
Figure 21; Example of the "Hello Patient" DataItem Model
Table 20: row 2: Parent DataItem (folder)
Figure 35: An Example of How a SDMN DataItem Diagram
Table 37: Row 1: DataItem (Folder)

SCE is replacing the SCEVocabulary element with the SCEKindSet element (and related elements).
SDMN uses the vocabulary mechanism and thus will need to be updated appropriately.

This issue is resolved by Issue SDMN-27

The resolution for Issue SDMN-27 removed Vocabularies from SDMN. Thus, this issue can be closed with no change.

We do not believe this notion is required in SDMN but if it is proven to required the icon should not be the same as a BPMN Case Model

This will be handled with Issue 29

We do not believe this notion is required in SDMN but if it is proven to required the icon should not be the same as a BPMN Case Model

Location is a physical attribute and should be left out of SDMN which should remain a Logical Data model.

This issue is now handled by Issue 4

Location should be removed from SDMN

The approach taken is not ideal

Leave the capability in the spec

We decided that this should remain.

SharedDataModel has property connector[0..*]: Connector

Is the meaning of the class Connector connector types or instances? The documentation of this property is:

This is a list of the Connectors (Composition, Containment, Reference, and Data Association) that are included in the SharedDataModel.

It is not clear whether this is a list of possible Connector types or a list of actual Connector instances. The type Connector has outgoing relationships targetRef and sourceRef, which suggests an instance level concept; I am not sure how this relates to the idea of Connector as a specialised ElementRelationshipType, which appears to be as a definer of relationship types.

Proposed change:

improve documentation of SharedDataModel.connectors to clarify whether it is a list of connector types used within a model, or connector instances.

Update Connector model and specification section

The Connector class should be updated so that it is a subclass of SCEElement instead of ElementRelationshipType.
Remove the constraints (for ElementRelationshipKind) from the four concrete types of Connectors.
Update the Text as needed.

The class DataItemRelationship seems to have gone in the UML models I have. From what I can see, Connector is now a direct descendant of ElementRelationshipType.

Aside: I would have expected this class to have a name like ConnectorType, or indeed, DataItemRelationshipType.

The UML diagrams in the PDF spec is different from in MagicDraw.

Remove Section 10.1.2

This section is obsolete and should not have been included in the draft spec. Thus, remove this section and sub-sections, including Figure 15 and Table 11.
There are no other references to the DataItemRelationship in the spec, except for in the Tables of Contents, Figures, and Tables.

The text references an SDMN element that no longer exists (or was renamed). The text reads: "All other properties that are REQUIRED for the unambiguous depiction of the SDMN element are derived from the referenced SDMN element [SDMNElementRef]."
At the end of the sentence should read: "[SDMNDiagramElement]" instead of "[SDMNElementRef]".

Fix incorrect Reference in DI Text

The text references an SDMN element that no longer exists (or was renamed). The text reads: "All other properties that are REQUIRED for the unambiguous depiction of the SDMN element are derived from the referenced SDMN element [SDMNElementRef]."
At the end of the sentence should read: "[SDMNDiagramElement]" instead of "[SDMNElementRef]".