This book presents a coherent description of the theoretical and
practical aspects of Coloured Petri Nets (CP-nets or CPN). It shows how
CP-nets have been de- veloped - from being a promising theoretical model
to being a full-fledged lan- guage for the design, specification,
simulation, validation and implementation of large software systems (and
other systems in which human beings and/or com- puters communicate by
means of some more or less formal rules). The book contains the formal
definition of CP-nets and the mathematical theory behind their analysis
methods. However, it has been the intention to write the book in such a
way that it also becomes attractive to readers who are more interested
in applications than the underlying mathematics. This means that a large
part of the book is written in a style which is closer to an engineering
textbook (or a users' manual) than it is to a typical textbook in
theoretical computer science. The book consists of three separate
volumes. The first volume defines the net model (i. e., hierarchical
CP-nets) and the basic concepts (e. g., the different behavioural
properties such as deadlocks, fair- ness and home markings). It gives a
detailed presentation of many small exam- ples and a brief overview of
some industrial applications. It introduces the for- mal analysis
methods. Finally, it contains a description of a set of CPN tools which
support the practical use of CP-nets.