A Framework for Evaluating Model-Driven Self-adaptive Software Systems

In the last few years, Model Driven Development (MDD), Component-based Software Development (CBSD), and context-oriented software have become interesting alternatives for the design and construction of self-adaptive software systems. In general, the ultimate goal of these technologies is to be able to reduce development costs and effort, while improving the modularity, flexibility, adaptability, and reliability of software systems. An analysis of these technologies shows them all to include the principle of the separation of concerns, and their further integration is a key factor to obtaining high-quality and self-adaptable software systems. Each technology identifies different concerns and deals with them separately in order to specify the design of the self-adaptive applications, and, at the same time, support software with adaptability and context-awareness. This research studies the development methodologies that employ the principles of model-driven development in building self-adaptive software systems. To this aim, this article proposes an evaluation framework for analysing and evaluating the features of model-driven approaches and their ability to support software with self-adaptability and dependability in highly dynamic contextual environment. Such evaluation framework can facilitate the software developers on selecting a development methodology that suits their software requirements and reduces the development effort of building self-adaptive software systems. This study highlights the major drawbacks of the propped model-driven approaches in the related works, and emphasise on considering the volatile aspects of self-adaptive software in the analysis, design and implementation phases of the development methodologies. In addition, we argue that the development methodologies should leave the selection of modelling languages and modelling tools to the software developers.Comment: model-driven architecture, COP, AOP, component composition, self-adaptive application, context oriented software developmen

Towards Product Lining Model-Driven Development Code Generators

A code generator systematically transforms compact models to detailed code. Today, code generation is regarded as an integral part of model-driven development (MDD). Despite its relevance, the development of code generators is an inherently complex task and common methodologies and architectures are lacking. Additionally, reuse and extension of existing code generators only exist on individual parts. A systematic development and reuse based on a code generator product line is still in its infancy. Thus, the aim of this paper is to identify the mechanism necessary for a code generator product line by (a) analyzing the common product line development approach and (b) mapping those to a code generator specific infrastructure. As a first step towards realizing a code generator product line infrastructure, we present a component-based implementation approach based on ideas of variability-aware module systems and point out further research challenges.Comment: 6 pages, 1 figure, Proceedings of the 3rd International Conference on Model-Driven Engineering and Software Development, pp. 539-545, Angers, France, SciTePress, 201

Requirements for model server enabled collaborating on building information models

The application of Building Information Modelling (BIM) has demonstrated enormous potential to deliver consistency in the construction collaboration process. BIM can define an explicit configuration for digitized information exchange, however the technology to collaborate on models has not yet delivered the industry requirements for BIM collaboration. This research project is intended to provide a fresh review of industry requirements for BIM collaboration and will analyse how these requirements can be supported using a model server as a collaboration platform. This paper presents a review of existing collaboration platforms, with a particular focus to evaluate the research and development efforts on model servers as a collaboration platform. This paper also reports on the findings of three focus group sessions with industry practitioners to identify any problems in the available collaboration systems. The focus group findings identify a number of issues in current collaboration environments which help to understand the main domains of user requirements for BIM collaboration. These requirement domains will be further analysed to identify functional and technical specifications for a model server enabled collaboration platform

Strengthening financial innovations in energy supply projects for rural exploitations in developing countries

Sustainable energy supply models are needed to achieve the Millennium Development Goals established by the United Nations for 2015. On the other hand, sustainability of agricultural exploitations in rural areas is a pre-requisite to achieve the objective of halving the proportion of people that lives in poverty, and productivity of such exploitations is closely related to energy supply. This article analyses the results of a survey of experts, suggesting that there may be good chances to innovate in the financing of agricultural electrification projects in developing countries. The experts’ opinion suggests that new sources of financing could be mobilised and oriented towards the promotion of sustainable initiatives in developing countries. Financial mechanisms should be adapted to the characteristics of decentralised systems of energy production with renewable sources or with mixed technologies, in order to overcome the barriers derived from the high initial price of the applications, and to the specific conditions of the agricultural sector. The participation of funds from the beneficiaries and the incorporation of the beneficiaries in the initial phases of project organisation would allow for the development of productive solutions with a higher potential to generate resources and to articulate sustainable proposals. r 2007 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved

Software development: A paradigm for the future

A new paradigm for software development that treats software development as an experimental activity is presented. It provides built-in mechanisms for learning how to develop software better and reusing previous experience in the forms of knowledge, processes, and products. It uses models and measures to aid in the tasks of characterization, evaluation and motivation. An organization scheme is proposed for separating the project-specific focus from the organization's learning and reuse focuses of software development. The implications of this approach for corporations, research and education are discussed and some research activities currently underway at the University of Maryland that support this approach are presented

Modelling mobile health systems: an application of augmented MDA for the extended healthcare enterprise

Mobile health systems can extend the enterprise computing system of the healthcare provider by bringing services to the patient any time and anywhere. We propose a model-driven design and development methodology for the development of the m-health components in such extended enterprise computing systems. The methodology applies a model-driven design and development approach augmented with formal validation and verification to address quality and correctness and to support model transformation. Recent work on modelling applications from the healthcare domain is reported. One objective of this work is to explore and elaborate the proposed methodology. At the University of Twente we are developing m-health systems based on Body Area Networks (BANs). One specialization of the generic BAN is the health BAN, which incorporates a set of devices and associated software components to provide some set of health-related services. A patient will have a personalized instance of the health BAN customized to their current set of needs. A health professional interacts with their\ud patients¿ BANs via a BAN Professional System. The set of deployed BANs are supported by a server. We refer to this distributed system as the BAN System. The BAN system extends the enterprise computing system of the healthcare provider. Development of such systems requires a sound software engineering approach and this is what we explore with the new methodology. The methodology is illustrated with reference to recent modelling activities targeted at real implementations. In the context of the Awareness project BAN implementations will be trialled in a number of clinical settings including epilepsy management and management of chronic pain

Business Process Innovation using the Process Innovation Laboratory

Most organizations today are required not only to establish effective business processes but they are required to accommodate for changing business conditions at an increasing rate. Many business processes extend beyond the boundary of the enterprise into the supply chain and the information infrastructure therefore is critical. Today nearly every business relies on their Enterprise System (ES) for process integration and the future generations of enterprise systems will increasingly be driven by business process models. Consequently process modeling and improvement will become vital for business process innovation (BPI) in future organizations. There is a significant body of knowledge on various aspect of process innovation, e.g. on conceptual modeling, business processes, supply chains and enterprise systems. Still an overall comprehensive and consistent theoretical framework with guidelines for practical applications has not been identified. The aim of this paper is to establish a conceptual framework for business process innovation in the supply chain based on advanced enterprise systems. The main approach to business process innovation in this context is to create a new methodology for exploring process models and patterns of applications. The paper thus presents a new concept for business process innovation called the process innovation laboratory a.k.a. the Ð-Lab. The Ð-Lab is a comprehensive framework for BPI using advanced enterprise systems. The Ð-Lab is a collaborative workspace for experimenting with process models and an explorative approach to study integrated modeling in a controlled environment. The Ð-Lab facilitates innovation by using an integrated action learning approach to process modeling including contemporary technological, organizational and business perspectivesNo; keywords