How to reach a usable DSL? Moving toward a Systematic Evaluation

Domain-Specific Languages (DSLs) are claimed to increase productivity,while reducing the required maintenance and programming expertise.  In thiscontext, DSL usability by domain experts is a key factor for its successfuladoption.Evidence that support those improvement claims is mostly anecdotal.  Oursystematic literature review showed that a usability evaluation was oftenskipped, relaxed, or at least omitted from papers reporting the development of DSLs.  Thefew exceptions mostly take place at the end of the development process where fixing problems identified is too expensive.We argue that a systematic approach based on User Interface experimentalvalidation  techniques should be used to assess the impact of the new DSLs.  The rationale is that assessing important and specially tailored usability attributes for DSLs early in language construction will ultimately foster a higher productivity of the DSL users. This paper, besides discussing thequality criteria, proposes a development and evaluation process that can be usedto achieve usable DSLs in a better way

Handling non-functional requirements in Model-Driven Development: an ongoing industrial survey

Model-Driven Development (MDD) is no longer a novel development paradigm. It has become mature from a research perspective and recent studies show its adoption in industry. Still, some issues remain a challenge. Among them, we are interested in the treatment of non-functional requirements (NFRs) in MDD processes. Very few MDD approaches have been reported to deal with NFRs (and they do it in a limited way). However, it is clear that NFRs need to be considered somehow in the final product of the MDD process. To better understand how NFRs are integrated into the existing MDD approaches, we have initiated the NFR4MDD project, a multi-national empirical study, based on interviews with companies working on MDD projects. Our project aims at surveying the state of the practice for this topic. In this paper, we summarize our research protocol and present the current status of our study. The discussion will focus on the peculiarities of our study’s context and organization involving about 20 researchers from 8 European countriesPeer ReviewedPostprint (author's final draft

A nanostructural view of the cell wall disassembly process during fruit ripening and postharvest storage by atomic force microscopy

Background: The mechanical properties of parenchyma cell walls and the strength and extension of adhesion areas between adjacent cells, jointly with cell turgor, are main determinants of firmness of fleshy fruits. These traits are modified during ripening leading to fruit softening. Cell wall modifications involve the depolymerisation of matrix glycans and pectins, the solubilisation of pectins and the loss of neutral sugars from pectin side chains. These changes weaken the cell walls and increase cell separation, which in combination with a reduction in cell turgor, bring about textural changes. Atomic force microscopy (AFM) has been used to characterize the nanostructure of cell wall polysaccharides during the ripening and postharvest storage of several fruits. This technique allows the imaging of individual polymers at high magnification with minimal sample preparation. Scope and approach: This paper reviews the main features of the cell wall disassembly process associated to fruit softening from a nanostructural point of view, as has been provided by AFM studies. Key findings and conclusions: AFM studies show that pectin size, ramification and complexity is reduced during fruit ripening and storage, and in most cases these changes correlate with softening. Postharvest treatments that improve fruit quality have been proven to preserve pectin structure, suggesting a clear link between softening and pectin metabolism. Nanostructural characterization of cellulose and hemicellulose during ripening has been poorly explored by AFM and the scarce results available are not conclusive. Globally, AFM could be a powerful tool to gain insights about the bases of textural fruit quality in fresh and stored fruits

Independent Validation of a Component Metrics Suite

This paper describes an independent validation study for a suite of reusability metrics for component based design (CBD). We use an approach to metrics definition and collection that is different from the one originally proposed by the original authors. The metrics under validation were proposed using a semi-formal notation, namely a combination of mathematical formulae with natural language descriptions for elementary parts of those formulae. They were then computed using proprietary tools. In contrast, we will present a formalization for the metrics suite that combines the UML 2.0 metamodel with OCL. By using this technique, our contribution provides: (i) a formal, portable and executable definition of the metrics set that can be used by other researchers and practitioners to perform independent validations of the metrics suite; (ii) a prototype working environment to perform such independent validation experiments, both with this and other metrics sets

USE-ME Empirical evaluation pilot study

We report on the pilot assessment of the feasibility of the USE-ME tool with master students in computer science which were involved into a DSL course. In total there were four groups consisted of two or three participants which were developing the following DSLs:DSL Spreadsheets - a DSL transforms an activity graph into a Gantt chart. The target users of this DSL are to be project managers.Gestures Kinect - a DSL which supports specification of communication between navy users using a Kinect device. The target users of this DSL are to be a navy operators.Peddy Paper - a DSL which creates several instances of personalised paddy papers. The target users are paddy paper builders.Smart House - a DSL which supports a design of the elements and operations that the house can have. It is meant to be used by house owners. The evaluation consisted of three learning session. The first one took place after four weeks of the DSL development. Students were introduced to the usability evaluation during a 2h theoretical lecture. For next 2h were introduced with the USE-ME tool and were guided to perform installation and set up working environment. Also, the students were given a participation questionnaire to fill in and describe a purpose of their DSL. In the end of a session, they were given the background questionnaire to fill till the following session which was happening 1 week after. Following two weekly 4h sessions were consisting of USE-ME hands on. The students were introduced to the modelling activities followed by Visualino example. For each activity, the same student from the group was using the tool to create USE-ME models for their DSL, while other students from the group were helping in deciding what would be a right specification. Finally, students were asked to try to finish the learned models and deliver them as a part of DSL course. After delivery, the students which were using the tool to model were asked to fill in a feedback questionnaire. The evaluation deliveries related to each DSL (project reports, USE-ME models), and ones related to participants (background and feedback questionnaire), as well as evaluation results, are attached in this data set

Using aspects to model volatile concerns

A rapidly changing market leads to software systems with highly volatile requirements. In many cases, new demands in software can often be met by extending the functionality of systems already in operation. By modularizing volatile requirements that can be altered at the client’s initiative or according to market demands, we can build a stepping-stone for management of requirements change. The volatility must be managed in a way that reduces the time and costs associated with updating a system to meet the new requirements. In this chapter, we present an approach for handling volatile concerns during early life cycle software modeling. The key insight is that techniques for aspect-oriented software development can be applied to modularize volatility and to weave volatile concerns into the base software artifacts

MULTI-PARADIGM MODELLING APPROACHES FOR CYBER-PHYSICAL SYSTEMS

Intelligent agents are software components that can work autonomously and proactively to solve the problems collaboratively. To this end, they can behave in a cooperative manner and collaborate with other agents constituting systems called Multi-agent Systems (MAS). These systems have different perspectives such as the internal structure, plan, interaction, organisation, role, environment and so on. By having these views, MASs can consider the structure, behaviour, interaction, and environment of the complex systems such as Cyber-physical Systems (CPS). Therefore, intelligent software agents and MASs can be used in the modelling and development of CPSs.There are different Domain-specific Modelling Languages (DSMLs) to build MASs with a focus on various MAS aspects. One of the generative MAS DSMLs is SEA_ML++ which presents a thorough Model-driven Engineering practice with including the abstract syntax, graphical concrete syntax, model-to-model transformations and model-to-code transformations with the support of Platform Independent and Platform Specific levels of MAS modelling. In this chapter, we discuss how SEA_ML++ is used for the design and implementation of agent-based CPSs. An MDE methodology is introduced in which SEA_ML++ can be used to design agent-based CPS and implement these systems on various agent execution platforms. As the evaluating case study, the development of a multi-agent garbage collection CPS is taken into consideration. The conducted study demonstrates how this CPS can be designed according to the various viewpoints of SEA_ML++ and then implemented and executed on Jason platform.</p