When you design a VisualAge part, you are really designing a class. You can think of a class as a cookie-cutter, or template, for creating new objects. It is your job to define the attributes the objects in your class have (their instance variables), and what actions they can do (their methods).
In this example, you define a class for creating a runner object. The class has the following attributes:
The runner can do the actions displayed around the perimeter of the figure:
This kind of figure, with attributes in the center and actions around the perimeter, is commonly used to design classes. You can sketch these class designs on index cards, one class per card. This allows you to easily throw away one design in favor of another. You can also arrange the cards, or classes, into a hierarchy, until you are confident of your design. Or, you can use the VisualAge Smalltalk UML Designer feature.