Model Generation with LLMs: From Requirements to UML Sequence Diagrams

Fuente: arXiv
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Main Authors: Ferrari, Alessio, Abualhaija, Sallam, Arora, Chetan
Format: Preprint
Published: 2024
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author Ferrari, Alessio
Abualhaija, Sallam
Arora, Chetan
author_facet Ferrari, Alessio
Abualhaija, Sallam
Arora, Chetan
contents Complementing natural language (NL) requirements with graphical models can improve stakeholders' communication and provide directions for system design. However, creating models from requirements involves manual effort. The advent of generative large language models (LLMs), ChatGPT being a notable example, offers promising avenues for automated assistance in model generation. This paper investigates the capability of ChatGPT to generate a specific type of model, i.e., UML sequence diagrams, from NL requirements. We conduct a qualitative study in which we examine the sequence diagrams generated by ChatGPT for 28 requirements documents of various types and from different domains. Observations from the analysis of the generated diagrams have systematically been captured through evaluation logs, and categorized through thematic analysis. Our results indicate that, although the models generally conform to the standard and exhibit a reasonable level of understandability, their completeness and correctness with respect to the specified requirements often present challenges. This issue is particularly pronounced in the presence of requirements smells, such as ambiguity and inconsistency. The insights derived from this study can influence the practical utilization of LLMs in the RE process, and open the door to novel RE-specific prompting strategies targeting effective model generation.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2404_06371
institution arXiv
publishDate 2024
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Model Generation with LLMs: From Requirements to UML Sequence Diagrams
Ferrari, Alessio
Abualhaija, Sallam
Arora, Chetan
Software Engineering
Computation and Language
Machine Learning
D.2; K.6.3; D.2.1; D.3.1; D.2.2; D.2.10; D.2.2; I.2; I.2.7
Complementing natural language (NL) requirements with graphical models can improve stakeholders' communication and provide directions for system design. However, creating models from requirements involves manual effort. The advent of generative large language models (LLMs), ChatGPT being a notable example, offers promising avenues for automated assistance in model generation. This paper investigates the capability of ChatGPT to generate a specific type of model, i.e., UML sequence diagrams, from NL requirements. We conduct a qualitative study in which we examine the sequence diagrams generated by ChatGPT for 28 requirements documents of various types and from different domains. Observations from the analysis of the generated diagrams have systematically been captured through evaluation logs, and categorized through thematic analysis. Our results indicate that, although the models generally conform to the standard and exhibit a reasonable level of understandability, their completeness and correctness with respect to the specified requirements often present challenges. This issue is particularly pronounced in the presence of requirements smells, such as ambiguity and inconsistency. The insights derived from this study can influence the practical utilization of LLMs in the RE process, and open the door to novel RE-specific prompting strategies targeting effective model generation.
title Model Generation with LLMs: From Requirements to UML Sequence Diagrams
topic Software Engineering
Computation and Language
Machine Learning
D.2; K.6.3; D.2.1; D.3.1; D.2.2; D.2.10; D.2.2; I.2; I.2.7
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2404.06371