Applied metamodelling to collaborative document authoring

This document describes a domain specific language tailored for collaborative document authoring processes. The language can support communication between content management systems and user interfaces in web collaborative applications. It allows dynamic rendering of user interfaces based on a collaboration model specified by end users. The construction of the language is supported by a metamodel. We demonstrate the use of the proposed language by implementation of a simple document authoring system

INTEROP deliverable DTG 6.2 : Method repository

This deliverable presents the INTEROP method chunks repository (MCR), its architecture and provided services. It includes the definition of a reusable method chunk, its structure, illustrated with examples of method chunks stored in the repository and guidelines for method chunks definition and characterisation covering tasks TG6.2 and TG6.3 of the work plan of the task group. The main result is the definition of the structure of the method chunk repository emphasizing the link to interoperability. Interoperability is a first-class concept in the structure of the method chunk repository. It not only characterizes method chunks, i.e. procedures to solve interoperability problems, but also interoperability cases, i.e. the presentation of actual problems involving interoperability issues. TG 6 has produced three MCR prototypes. Two experiments were undertaken using the Metis system and one using ConceptBase. The task group attended a two-day intense workshop on Metis. As a result, two experiments with Metis as platform for the method chunk repository are under way and reported in this deliverable. One is realizing the structure of the MCR as specified in this report. The other is an alternative approach that serves as a benchmark and is reported in the appendix. The ConceptBase prototype utilizes the metamodel presented in this deliverable. We have analysed three cases involving various aspects of interoperability. One case is about establishing a broker platform for insurance agents, the second about linking the information systems in the public utility sector, and the third case is establishing the relation of the ATHENA Model-Driven Interoperability Framework to the goals of the MCR. The results of the TG6 have been published at the ISD conference 2006 and the ER conference 2006. Copies of the papers are included in the appendix. The report of the example session with the method chunk repository has been shifted towards deliverable TG6.3 (Tutorial of the MCR). This is the more logical place. We want to emphasize that TG6 was not only busy in drafting concepts, exploring the state of the art, and analyzing cases. We are actually experimenting with a prototype and consider this a valuable contribution to the network. As soon as the prototype is stable, knowledge about interoperability solutions can be coded in this repository and can guide designers of interoperable systems by experience knowledge

NOSTROMO - D5.1 - ATM Performance Metamodels - Preliminary Release

This deliverable presents the results obtained with the meta-modelling process presented in D3.1 and D3.2 applied to the two micromodels (or simulators), Mercury and FLITAN, themselves implementing concepts from four SESAR solutions, PJ01.01, PJ07.02, PJ08-01, and PJ02.08. The objective of the meta-modelling process is explained briefly again in the introduction, in particular with respect to performance assessment. The rationale for the selection of the SESAR solutions implemented in the simulators are briefly explained too. The simulators are presented in two distinct chapters. First, a general presentation of each simulator is given, with past challenges and development, before explaining the development steps carried out to implement the concepts from the chosen solutions. Domain research questions that could be answered by these implementations are highlighted along the way. The meta-modelling process is then briefly explained again, followed by the results obtained with the two simulators, in distinct sections. The results highlight the performance of the meta-model with respect to approximating the output of the micromodels, but not the performance of the models themselves with respect to the research questions, which will be explored in WP7 instead. The deliverable closes with some considerations on the meta-modelling performance and next steps for this line of work

The Modelery: a model-based software development repository

Purpose – This paper aims to present the Modelery, a platform for collaborative repository to support model-based software development. The Modelery is a Web platform, composed both by a Web page and Web services for interoperability. Design/methodology/approach – By performing a study in the existing platforms, it was possible to achieve a set of issues to tackle. The issues enabled the possibility to define a set of requirements that allowed the authors to design a new platform, and to perform a model-driven software development process, which started from the requirements until reaching the final software solution. Findings – With this work, it was possible to perform a survey on the currently available artifacts repositories, categorize them and identify their shortcomings. This was essential to define the set of requirements for a new platform to overcome the identified issues. This process leads to a platform able to improve the currently available solutions, and validated in the scientific community. In this paper, the authors also explore the applications of the repository. First, they use the Modelery to replace an older model’s repository. Second, they have enabled the communication between other tools and the Modelery via Web services. Originality/value – This work presents a new Web repository for software artifacts aimed at supporting researchers and software developers. The presented platform is an improvement over other platforms on the integration of artifacts repository, social functionalities and scientific publications integration. The authors conclude this paper by comparing the achieved platform in terms of functionalities, against the other analyzed platforms

A tool framework for developing context-sensitive user assistance systems using model-driven aspect weaving

Ankara : The Department of Computer Engineering and the Graduate School of Engineering and Science of Bilkent University, 2012.Thesis (Master's) -- Bilkent University, 2012.Includes bibliographical references.User assistance systems act as a guide for the users of software products. These systems aim to guarantee a successful user experience by helping in performing tasks. Early on, off-line user manuals were mostly the mediums of user assistance, and technically, they were independent of the systems they belong to. The upward trend in user assistance systems is that the provision of assistance is automated through some attached mechanisms to the software systems. There have been numerous proposals introducing fresh and novel methods for the purpose of automated user assistance. Specifically, embedded user assistance consists of instructional or conceptual information that appears within a software application window. It includes embedded help that appear within the application, field labels, and page overviews. The overall objective of this thesis is to reveal the state of the art advances in user assistance systems, and to propose a tool framework for developing contextsensitive user assistance systems. Firstly, we conducted two systematic literature reviews for both automated and embedded user assistance systems. The systematic literature reviews are required for acquiring solid background on embedded user assistance systems as well as for exploring the main obstacles to automated user assistance systems. The research findings are presented in parallel with the work published in the literature, and we aim at revealing a variety of techniques used for automated and embedded user assistance. The systematic reviews are conducted by a multiphase study selection process under a lot of articles obtained by dedicated search strategies. Since there has been no study to systematically undertake the state of user assistance systems, our work has a pioneering value of contents providing a road-map of current trends for further researchers in the field of user assistance. Having analyzed the results of systematic reviews, we conducted a survey of help authoring tools that revealed the lack of generalized context-sensitive user assistance solutions. Also, the utilization of methods, algorithms and tools differs from domain to domain, being rather scattered. We aimed at developing embedded context-sensitive user assistance systems, which is not trivial and has to meet several challenges. Unfortunately, user-assistance concerns such as help content and related weaving information cannot be easily localized in single modules and as such tend to crosscut multiple modules. The reuse of user assistance tools for different applications is required because developing custom-based user assistance for each separate application is laborious. Consequently, the obstacles related to the development of context-sensitive user assistance systems have brought out the idea of a tool framework for this purpose. To address these issues we developed an aspect-oriented tool framework Assistant-Pro that can be used to develop context-sensitive embedded user assistance for multiple applications. The framework provides tools for defining the process model, defining guidance related to process steps, and modularizing and weaving help concerns in the target application for which user guidance needs to be provided. The tool has been originally developed and validated in the context of Aselsan, a large Turkish defense electronics company.Açar, MuratM.S

A metamodel to annotate knowledge based engineering codes as enterprise knowledge resources

The encoding of Knowledge Based Engineering (KBE) software applications is becoming a prominent tool for the automation of knowledge intensive tasks carried out using Computer Aided Design (CAD) technology. However, limitations exist on the ability to manage the engineering knowledge models embedded in these executable KBE applications. This research proposes a metamodel to annotate encoded KBE applications. Resulting from the annotation, XKMs become explicit knowledge resources whose content can be better accessed and managed. The attachment of metadata to data sets in enterprise repositories is a necessary step to identify and index them so they can be queried, browsed and changed. The sophistication of metadata models for these data “items” ranges from the simple indexing using numbers to more sophisticated representations describing their context information (i.e. author, creation date, etc.), their internal structure and their content. Current engineering data repositories like Product Data Management and Product Lifecycle Management systems offer predefined metamodels to annotate a range of engineering data items including CAD files or special types of documents. At the moment, there is no metadata model specifically designed to annotate KBE codes. In this situation, an undifferentiated metadata model needs to be used for XKMs. However, in this case the only information retained by the system about them would be context metadata. Once an instance of the metadata is attached to an XKM, it can be used as its identifier within an enterprise data repository. The proposed metamodel contains abstract entities to annotate XKMs. The resulting descriptive model for an XKM pays attention to its internal structure and its operation at different levels of granularity. The particular design of the proposed metamodel positions it at a level of abstraction between non executable domain knowledge models and executable KBE applications. This design choice is made to support the use of the metadata not only as an informative model but also as an executable one. The achievement of this target is becoming possible through the emergence of semantic modelling standards that allow the description of data models independently from the language of implementation. Using this approach, the generation of code and metadata is made automatically using mapping rules resulting from the semantic agreement between models and specific syntax rules. The immediate application of the developed metamodel is to annotate XKMs within PLM systems. The approach shall contribute not only to systematically store instances of XKMs but also to manage the lifecycle of the engineering knowledge encoded within them. The proposed representation provides a more comprehensive approach for non KBE language experts to understand the code. On this basis, the change on the metamodels can be automatically traced back to the code and vice-versa. During the research, evidence has been gathered from the community of KBE technology users and vendors on the need to support this research effort. In the long term, the research contributes to the use of PLM systems as a platform for engineering knowledge management.EThOS - Electronic Theses Online ServiceGBUnited Kingdo