Tool integration at the meta-model level: the Fujaba approach

  • Authors:

  • Sven Burmester;Holger Giese;Jörg Niere;Matthias Tichy;Jörg P. Wadsack;Robert Wagner;Lothar Wendehals;Albert Zündorf

  • Affiliations:

  • University of Paderborn, Software Engineering Group, Department of Computer Science, Germany;University of Paderborn, Software Engineering Group, Department of Computer Science, Germany;University of Siegen, Software Engineering Group, Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Germany;University of Paderborn, Software Engineering Group, Department of Computer Science, Germany;University of Paderborn, Software Engineering Group, Department of Computer Science, Germany;University of Paderborn, Software Engineering Group, Department of Computer Science, Germany;University of Paderborn, Software Engineering Group, Department of Computer Science, Germany;University of Kassel, Software Engineering Research Group, Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Germany

  • Venue:
  • International Journal on Software Tools for Technology Transfer (STTT) - Special section on tool integration applications and frameworks
  • Year:
  • 2004

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Abstract

Today’s development processes employ a variety of notations and tools, e.g., the Unified Modeling Language UML, the Standard Description Language SDL, requirements databases, design tools, code generators, model checkers, etc. For better process support, the employed tools may be organized within a tool suite or integration platform, e.g., Rational Rose or Eclipse. While these tool-integration platforms usually provide GUI adaption mechanisms and functional adaption via application programming interfaces, they frequently do not provide appropriate means for data integration at the meta-model level. Thus, overlapping and redundant data from different “integrated” tools may easily become inconsistent and unusable. We propose two design patterns that provide a flexible basis for the integration of different tool data at the meta-model level. To achieve consistency between meta-models, we describe rule-based mechanisms providing generic solutions for managing overlapping and redundant data. The proposed mechanisms are widely used within the Fujaba Tool Suite. We report about our implementation and application experiences .