Probabilistic Graphical Modelling for Software Product Lines: A Frameweork for Modeling and Reasoning under Uncertainty

This work provides a holistic investigation into the realm of feature modeling within software product lines. The work presented identifies limitations and challenges within the current feature modeling approaches. Those limitations include, but not limited to, the dearth of satisfactory cognitive presentation, inconveniency in scalable systems, inflexibility in adapting changes, nonexistence of predictability of models behavior, as well as the lack of probabilistic quantification of model’s implications and decision support for reasoning under uncertainty. The work in this thesis addresses these challenges by proposing a series of solutions. The first solution is the construction of a Bayesian Belief Feature Model, which is a novel modeling approach capable of quantifying the uncertainty measures in model parameters by a means of incorporating probabilistic modeling with a conventional modeling approach. The Bayesian Belief feature model presents a new enhanced feature modeling approach in terms of truth quantification and visual expressiveness. The second solution takes into consideration the unclear support for the reasoning under the uncertainty process, and the challenging constraint satisfaction problem in software product lines. This has been done through the development of a mathematical reasoner, which was designed to satisfy the model constraints by considering probability weight for all involved parameters and quantify the actual implications of the problem constraints. The developed Uncertain Constraint Satisfaction Problem approach has been tested and validated through a set of designated experiments. Profoundly stating, the main contributions of this thesis include the following: • Develop a framework for probabilistic graphical modeling to build the purported Bayesian belief feature model. • Extend the model to enhance visual expressiveness throughout the integration of colour degree variation; in which the colour varies with respect to the predefined probabilistic weights. • Enhance the constraints satisfaction problem by the uncertainty measuring of the parameters truth assumption. • Validate the developed approach against different experimental settings to determine its functionality and performance

Advances in Conceptual Modeling - Foundations and Applications [electronic resource] : ER 2007 Workshops CMLSA, FP-UML, ONISW, QoIS, RIGiM, SeCoGIS, Auckland, New Zealand, November 5-9, 2007, Proceedings /

The 26th International Conference on Conceptual Modeling in Auckland, New Zealand, hosted six workshops which allowed participants to focus their p- sentations and discussions on advanced topics that cannot easily ?t the general conference scope. Thirteen good quality proposals were received and nine were selected. Due to the similarity of their scope, two pairs were suggested to merge, leading to seven proposals. One workshop attracted fewer submissions than expected, so that its selected papers were integrated into the conference. Finally, six wo- shopswerekept.Interestingly,fourofthem(FP-UML,ONISW,QoIS,SeCoGIS) were a sequel of workshops that were held in the last few years, while two were new (CMLSA, RIGiM), exhibiting both the maturity and the innovation of the workshops. Following the call for papers, we received 114 complete submissions, from which 40 quality papers wereselected, giving an acceptance rate of 35% (a fairly standard score for workshops). The following six workshops were organized: – ConceptualModellingforLifeSciencesApplications (CMLSA2007),chaired by Yi-Ping Phoebe Chen and Sven Hartmann. This workshopaddressed the speci?c challenges posed by the large data volumes, the complexity and the data and software heterogeneity involved by life science applications. – Foundations and Practices of UML (FP-UML 2007), chaired by Juan Trujillo and Je?rey Parsons. The third edition of this workshop gathered researchers and practitioners on topics related to data warehouses, security, model transformation, state diagrams development and model quality.CMLSA 2007 – International Workshop on Conceptual Modelling for Life Sciences Applications -- Preface to CMLSA 2007 -- Knowledge Discovery in Life Sciences -- Pattern Recognition of Single-Molecule Force Spectroscopy Data -- Massive Protein Structural Property Explorations Using New Indexing Mechanism -- Data Integration and Exchange in Health Informatics -- Data Access and Management in ACGT: Tools to Solve Syntactic and Semantic Heterogeneities Between Clinical and Image Databases -- Ontology-Based Data Integration in Data Logistics Workflows -- Model-Driven Development Based Transformation of Stereotyped Class Diagrams to XML Schemas in a Healthcare Context -- Conceptual Modelling for Biological Systems -- An Extendable System for Conceptual Modeling and Simulation of Signal Transduction Pathways -- Toward an Ontological Database for Subcellular Neuroanatomy -- Seed-Based Generation of Personalized Bio-ontologies for Information Extraction -- FP-UML 2007 – International Workshop on Foundations and Practices of UML -- Preface to FP-UML 2007 -- Improving the Use of UML Diagrams -- Developing State Diagrams Using a State Specialization Technique -- Quality Dependencies Among Use Case Models and Sequence Diagrams Developed by Novice Systems Analysts -- M-BPSec: A Method for Security Requirement Elicitation from a UML 2.0 Business Process Specification -- Model Transformations and Extensions -- Applying Model Transformation By-Example on Business Process Modeling Languages -- Extending OCL to Ensure Model Transformations -- A UML Profile for Modeling Data Warehouse Usage -- ONISW 2007 – InternationalWorkshop on Ontologies and Information Systems for the Semantic Web -- Preface to ONISW 2007 -- A Method for Semi-automatic Creation of Ontologies Based on Texts -- Enriching OWL with Instance Recognition Semantics for Automated Semantic Annotation -- Making Web Users’ Domain Models Explicit by Applying Ontologies -- Provability-Based Semantic Interoperability Via Translation Graphs -- QoIS 2007 – International Workshop on Quality of Information Systems -- Preface to QoIS 2007 -- PQM vs. BPQM: Studying the Tailoring of a General Quality Model to a Specific Domain -- An Ontological Approach for the Quality Assessment of Computer Science Conferences -- Using Practitioners for Assessing the Understandability of UML Statechart Diagrams with Composite States -- RIGiM 2007 – International Workshop on Requirements, Intentions and Goals in Conceptual Modelling -- Preface to RIGiM 2007 -- Keynote -- An Ontology for Requirements -- Requirements and Goals – Methods -- GOORE : Goal-Oriented and Ontology Driven Requirements Elicitation Method -- Early Prioritisation of Goals -- Goal-Aligned Requirements Generation -- A Model-Driven Goal-Oriented Requirement Engineering Approach for Data Warehouses -- Visually Effective Goal Models Using KAOS -- Agent Based Executable Conceptual Models Using i* and CASO -- Requirements and Goals – Concepts -- Achieving, Satisficing, and Excelling -- On the Adequacy of i* Models for Representing and Analyzing Software Architectures -- Extending Argumentation to Goal-Oriented Requirements Engineering -- SeCoGIS 2007 – International Workshop on Semantic and Conceptual Issues in Geographic Information Systems -- Preface to SeCoGIS 2007 -- Moving Objects -- Modeling Historical and Future Spatio-temporal Relationships of Moving Objects in Databases -- Towards a Semantic Spatial Model for Pedestrian Indoor Navigation -- Modeling Collaborative Semantics with a Geographic Recommender -- Dynamically Traveling Web Service Clustering Based on Spatial and Temporal Aspects -- Advances in Conceptual Modelling for GIS -- A Graph-Oriented Model and Query Language for Events -- PLR Partitions: A Conceptual Model of Maps -- A Conceptual Framework to Support Semantic Interoperability of Geospatial Datacubes -- Integrity Constraints and Approximate Reasoning -- On Languages for the Specification of Integrity Constraints in Spatial Conceptual Models -- Approximate Queries by Relaxing Structural Constraints in GIS -- Ensuring the Semantic Correctness of Complex Regions.The 26th International Conference on Conceptual Modeling in Auckland, New Zealand, hosted six workshops which allowed participants to focus their p- sentations and discussions on advanced topics that cannot easily ?t the general conference scope. Thirteen good quality proposals were received and nine were selected. Due to the similarity of their scope, two pairs were suggested to merge, leading to seven proposals. One workshop attracted fewer submissions than expected, so that its selected papers were integrated into the conference. Finally, six wo- shopswerekept.Interestingly,fourofthem(FP-UML,ONISW,QoIS,SeCoGIS) were a sequel of workshops that were held in the last few years, while two were new (CMLSA, RIGiM), exhibiting both the maturity and the innovation of the workshops. Following the call for papers, we received 114 complete submissions, from which 40 quality papers wereselected, giving an acceptance rate of 35% (a fairly standard score for workshops). The following six workshops were organized: – ConceptualModellingforLifeSciencesApplications (CMLSA2007),chaired by Yi-Ping Phoebe Chen and Sven Hartmann. This workshopaddressed the speci?c challenges posed by the large data volumes, the complexity and the data and software heterogeneity involved by life science applications. – Foundations and Practices of UML (FP-UML 2007), chaired by Juan Trujillo and Je?rey Parsons. The third edition of this workshop gathered researchers and practitioners on topics related to data warehouses, security, model transformation, state diagrams development and model quality