Melange: A Meta-language for Modular and Reusable Development of DSLs
Domain-Specific Languages (DSLs) are now developed for a wide variety of domains to address specific concerns in the development of complex systems. When engineering new DSLs, it is likely that previous efforts spent on the development of other languages could be leveraged, especially when their domains overlap. However, legacy DSLs may not fit exactly the end user requirements and thus require further extension, restriction, or specialization. While current language workbenches provide import mechanisms, they usually lack an explicit support for such customizations of imported artifacts. In this paper, we propose an approach for building DSLs by safely assembling and customizing legacy DSLs artifacts. This approach is based on typing relations that provide a reasoning layer for manipulating DSLs while ensuring type safety. On top of this reasoning layer, we provide an algebra of operators for extending, restricting, and assembling separate DSL artifacts. We implemented the typing relations and algebra into the Melange meta-language. We illustrate Melange through the modular definition of an executable modeling language for the Internet Of Things domain. We show how it eases the definition of new DSLs by maximizing the reuse of legacy artifacts without introducing issues in terms of performance, technical ecosystem compatibility, or generated code volume.
Mon 26 OctDisplayed time zone: Eastern Time (US & Canada) change
10:30 - 12:00 | Language Development and EvaluationSLE at Grand Station 2 Chair(s): Davide Di Ruscio University of L'Aquila | ||
10:30 10mDay opening | Opening SLE | ||
10:40 30mTalk | On Integrating Graphical and Textual Editors for a UML Profile Based Domain Specific Language: An Industrial Experience SLE Salome Maro Chalmers University of Technology, Sweden, Jan-Philipp Steghöfer Chalmers University of Technology, Sweden, Anthony Anjorin Chalmers University of Technology, Sweden, Matthias Tichy University of Ulm, Germany, Lars Gelin Ericsson, Sweden DOI | ||
11:10 30mTalk | An Empirical Study on Simplification of Business Process Modeling Languages SLE Eric Umuhoza Politecnico di Milano, Italy, Marco Brambilla Politecnico di Milano, Italy, Davide Ripamonti Politecnico di Milano, Italy, Jordi Cabot ICREA, Spain DOI Media Attached | ||
11:40 20mTalk | Melange: A Meta-language for Modular and Reusable Development of DSLs SLE Thomas Degueule INRIA, France, Benoit Combemale INRIA, France, Arnaud Blouin INSA Rennes, France, Olivier Barais University of Rennes 1, France, Jean-Marc Jézéquel University of Rennes 1, France DOI |