An effigy represents model metadata, and is contained by the model directory or by another effigy. The effigy, for example, keeps track of where the model originated (from a URI or file) and whether the model has been modified since the URI or file was read. In design automation, such information is often called "metadata." When we began to design this class, we called it ModelModel, because it was a model of a Ptolemy II model. However, this name seemed awkward, so we changed it to Effigy. We also considered the name Proxy for the class. We rejected that name because of the common use of the word "proxy" in distributed object-oriented models.
The Effigy class extends CompositeEntity, so an instance of Effigy can contain entities. By convention, an effigy contains all open instances of Tableau associated with the model. It also contains a string attribute named "identifier" with a value that uniquely identifies the model. A typical choice (which depends on the configuration) is the canonical URI for a MoML file that describes the model. In the case of an effigy contained by another, a typical choice is the URI of the parent effigy, a pound sign "#", and a name.
An effigy may contain other effigies. The master effigy in such a containment hierarchy is typically associated with a URI or file. Contained effigies are associated with the same file, and represent structured data within the top-level representation in the file. The masterEffigy() method returns that master effigy. The topEffigy() method in this base class returns the same master effigy. However, in derived classes, a master effigy may be contained by another effigy, so the top effigy is not the same as the master effigy. The top effigy is directly contained by the ModelDirectory in the Configuration.
NOTE: It might seem more natural for the identifier to match the name of the effigy rather than recording the identifier in a string attribute. But in Ptolemy II, an entity name cannot have periods in it, and a URI typically does have periods in it.
@author Steve Neuendorffer and Edward A. Lee
@version $Id: Effigy.java,v 1.71.4.1 2008/03/26 19:29:15 cxh Exp $
@since Ptolemy II 1.0
@Pt.ProposedRating Green (eal)
@Pt.AcceptedRating Yellow (celaine)
@see ModelDirectory
@see Tableau