Towards the generation of graphical modelling environments aided by patterns

The final publication is available at Springer via http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-27653-3_16Model-Driven Engineering (MDE) promotes the use of models to conduct all phases of software development in an automated way. Such models are described using Domain Specific Modelling Languages (DSMLs). While the definition of DSMLs and their supporting environments are recurring activities in MDE, they are mostly developed ad-hoc from scratch. This paper proposes the use of patterns to describe the abstract and concrete graphical syntax of DSMLs, and to automate the generation of a graphical modelling environment for them.Work supported by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitivity (TIN2011-24139 and TIN2014-52129-R), the R&D programme of the Madrid Region (S2013/ICE-3006), and the EU commission (FP7-ICT-2013-10, #611125)