Metamodel Instance Generation: A systematic literature review

Modelling and thus metamodelling have become increasingly important in Software Engineering through the use of Model Driven Engineering. In this paper we present a systematic literature review of instance generation techniques for metamodels, i.e. the process of automatically generating models from a given metamodel. We start by presenting a set of research questions that our review is intended to answer. We then identify the main topics that are related to metamodel instance generation techniques, and use these to initiate our literature search. This search resulted in the identification of 34 key papers in the area, and each of these is reviewed here and discussed in detail. The outcome is that we are able to identify a knowledge gap in this field, and we offer suggestions as to some potential directions for future research.Comment: 25 page

An invariant-based method for the analysis of declarative model-to-model transformations

The final publication is available at Springer via http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-87875-9_3Proceedings of 11th International Conference, MoDELS 2008, Toulouse, France, September 28 - October 3, 2008In this paper we propose a method to derive OCL invariants from declarative specifications of model-to-model transformations. In particular we consider two of the most prominent approaches for specifying such transformations: Triple Graph Grammars and QVT. Once the specification is expressed in the form of invariants, the transformation developer can use such description to verify properties of the original transformation (e.g. whether it defines a total, surjective or injective function), and to validate the transformation by the automatic generation of valid pairs of source and target models.Work supported by the Spanish Ministry of Education and Science, projects MOSAIC (TSI2005-08225-C07-06), MODUWEB (TIN2006-09678) and TIN2005-06053, and an UOC-IN3 research gran

Backwards reasoning for model transformations: Method and applications

This is the author’s version of a work that was accepted for publication in Journal of Systems and Software. Changes resulting from the publishing process, such as peer review, editing, corrections, structural formatting, and other quality control mechanisms may not be reflected in this document. Changes may have been made to this work since it was submitted for publication. A definitive version was subsequently published in Journal of Systems and Software, VOL 116, (2016) DOI 10.1016/j.jss.2015.08.017Model transformations are key elements of Model Driven Engineering. Current challenges for transformation languages include improving usability (i.e., succinct means to express the transformation intent) and devising powerful analysis methods. In this paper, we show how backwards reasoning helps in both respects. The reasoning is based on a method that, given an OCL expression and a transformation rule, calculates a constraint that is satisfiable before the rule application if and only if the original OCL expression is satisfiable afterwards. With this method we can improve the usability of the rule execution process by automatically deriving suitable application conditions for a rule (or rule sequence) to guarantee that applying that rule does not break any integrity constraint (e.g. meta-model constraints). When combined with model finders, this method facilitates the validation, verification, testing and diagnosis of transformations, and we show several applications for both inplace and exogenous transformations.Work partially funded by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (projects TIN2008-00444, TIN2011-24139 and TIN2014-52129-R), the Community of Madrid with project SICOMORO (S2013/ICE-3006), the EU Commission with project MONDO (FP7-ICT-2013-10, #611125) and a research grant from UOC-IN3 (Internet Interdisciplinary Institute). We would like to thank Hamza Ed-Douibi for his work on the tool implementation part, and the reviewers for their useful comments

Lightweight Testing of Communication Networks with e-Motions

This paper illustrates the use of high-level domain specific models to specify and test some performance properties of complex systems, in particular Communication Networks, using a light-weight approach. By following a Model-Driven Engineering (MDE) approach, we show the benefits of constructing very abstract models of the systems under test, which can then be easily prototyped and analysed to explore their properties. For this purpose we use e-Motions, a language and its supporting toolkit that allows end-user modelling of real-time systems and their analysis in a graphical manner.Junta de Andalucía P07-TIC-03184Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación TIN2008-0310

Metamodel-based model conformance and multiview consistency checking

Model-driven development, using languages such as UML and BON, often makes use of multiple diagrams (e.g., class and sequence diagrams) when modeling systems. These diagrams, presenting different views of a system of interest, may be inconsistent. A metamodel provides a unifying framework in which to ensure and check consistency, while at the same time providing the means to distinguish between valid and invalid models, that is, conformance. Two formal specifications of the metamodel for an object-oriented modeling language are presented, and it is shown how to use these specifications for model conformance and multiview consistency checking. Comparisons are made in terms of completeness and the level of automation each provide for checking multiview consistency and model conformance. The lessons learned from applying formal techniques to the problems of metamodeling, model conformance, and multiview consistency checking are summarized