  The Unified Modeling Language (UML) community has started to define so-called
profiles in order to better suit the needs of specific domains or settings.
Product lines1 represent a special breed of systems they are extensible
semi-finished pieces of software. Completing the semi-finished software leads
to various software pieces, typically specific applications, which share the
same core. Though product lines have been developed for a wide range of
domains, they apply common construction principles. The intention of the UML-F
profile (for framework architectures) is the definition of a UML subset,
enriched with a few UML-compliant extensions, which allows the annotation of
such artifacts. This paper presents aspects of the profile with a focus on
patterns and exemplifies the profile's usage.
