ArchiMate® 3.1 Specification. The Open Group
resembles them. In the remainder of this document, unless otherwise noted, the symbols used to depict the language concepts represent the ArchiMate standard notation. This standard notation for most elements consists of a box with an icon in the upper-right corner. In several cases, this icon by itself may also be used as an alternative notation. This standard iconography should be preferred whenever possible so that anyone knowing the ArchiMate language can read the diagrams produced in the language.
3.8 Use of Nesting
Nesting elements inside other elements can be used as an alternative graphical notation to express some relationships. This is explained in more detail in Section 5.1 and in the definition of each of these relationships.
3.9 Use of Colors and Notational Cues
In the metamodel pictures within this standard, shades of grey are used to distinguish elements belonging to the different aspects of the ArchiMate framework, as follows:
• White for abstract (i.e., non-instantiable) concepts
• Light grey for passive structures
• Medium grey for behavior
• Dark grey for active structures
In ArchiMate models, there are no formal semantics assigned to colors and the use of color is left to the modeler. However, they can be used freely to stress certain aspects in models. For instance, in many of the example models presented in this standard, colors are used to distinguish between the layers of the ArchiMate Core Framework, as follows:
• Yellow for the Business Layer
• Blue for the Application Layer
• Green for the Technology Layer
They can also be used for visual emphasis. A recommended text providing guidelines is Chapter 6 of [1].
In addition to the colors, other notational cues can be used to distinguish between the layers of the framework. A letter M, S, B, A, T, P, or I in the top-left corner of an element can be used to denote a Motivation, Strategy, Business, Application, Technology, Physical, or Implementation & Migration element, respectively. An example of this notation is depicted in Example 34.
The standard notation also uses a convention with the shape of the corners of its symbols for different element types, as follows:
• Square corners are used to denote structure elements
• Round corners are used to denote behavior elements
• Diagonal corners are used to denote motivation elements
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1 Note that this was called “used by” in previous versions of the standard. For the sake of clarity, this name has been changed to “serving”.
4 Generic Metamodel
4.1 Behavior and Structure Elements
The main hierarchy of behavior and structure elements of the ArchiMate language is presented in the metamodel fragment of Figure 4. It defines these elements in a generic, layer-independent way. Note that most of these elements (the white boxes) are abstract metamodel elements; i.e., these are not instantiated in models but only serve to structure the metamodel. The notation presented in this chapter is therefore the generic way in which the specializations of these elements (i.e., the elements of the different architecture layers) are depicted.
Figure 4: Hierarchy of Behavior and Structure Elements
This generic metamodel fragment consists of two main types of elements: structure (“nouns”) and behavior elements (“verbs”).
Structure elements can be subdivided into active structure elements and passive structure elements. Active structure elements can be further subdivided into external active structure elements (also called interfaces) and internal active structure elements.
Behavior elements can be subdivided into internal behavior elements, external behavior elements (also called services), and events.
These three aspects – active structure, behavior, and passive structure – have been inspired by natural language, where a sentence has a subject (active structure), a verb (behavior), and an object (passive structure).
Figure 5 specifies the main relationships between the behavior and structure elements defined above. For an explanation of the different types of relationships see Chapter 5. In this and other metamodel figures, the label of a relationship signifies the role of the source element in the relationship; e.g., a service serves an internal behavior element.
Figure 5: Behavior and Structure Elements Metamodel
Note: This figure does not show all permitted relationships; every element in the language can have composition, aggregation, and specialization relationships to elements of the same type. Furthermore, there are indirect relationships that can be derived, as explained in Section 5.7. The full specification of permitted relationships can be found in Appendix B.
Note: This figure is to be read as a generic template for the layers of the ArchiMate core (see Section 3.4), but is not applied directly. Each layer defines its own specialized version of this.
4.1.1 Active Structure Elements
Active structure elements are the subjects that can perform behavior. These can be subdivided into internal active structure elements; i.e., the business actors, application components, nodes, etc., that realize this behavior, and external active structure elements; i.e., the interfaces that expose this behavior to the environment. An interface provides an external view on the service provider and hides its internal structure.
An internal active structure element represents an entity that is capable of performing behavior.
Active structure elements are denoted using boxes with square corners and an icon in the upper-right corner, or by the icon on its own.
Figure 6: Generic Internal Active Structure Element Notation
An external active structure element, called an interface, represents a point of access where one or more services are provided to the environment.
Figure 7: Generic External Active Structure Elements (Interface) Notation
4.1.2 Behavior Elements
Behavior elements represent the dynamic aspects of the enterprise. Similar to active