Extendiendo el alcance de los modelos

Jean Bezivin, profesor de la Universidad de Nantes, conduce un proyecto que ahonda la apuesta por el desarrollo guiado por modelos (MDD/MDE): AtlanMod, el equipo que lidera, trabaja en el desarrollo de un framework que permita actuar por encima de distintos metamodelos. Como en investigaciones previas lo ha mencionado, se trata de un meta-meta-modelo:

The AtlanMod team is progressively developing AmmA, a conceptual modeling framework. This modeling toolkit provides a high level view of MDE, implementing a number of domain specific languages like KM3 to construct metamodels, ATL to define model transformations, AMW to specify the abstract correspondences between models, or TCS to express the relations between grammars and metamodels. The AmmA toolkit implements the advanced artifacts and operations characteristics of last generation generative domain modeling facilities.

(...) The MDE community has been using the concepts of terminal model, metamodel, and metametamodel for quite some time. A terminal model is a representation of a system. It captures some characteristics of the system and provides knowledge about it. In MDE we are interested in terminal models expressed in precise languages. The abstract syntax of a modeling language, when expressed as a model, is called a metamodel. A language definition is given by an abstract syntax (a metamodel), one or more concrete syntaxes, a definition of its semantics, etc. The relation between a model expressed in a language and the metamodel of this language is called conformsTo. This should not be confused with the representation relation (repOf) holding between a terminal model ant the system it represents. Metamodels are in turn expressed in a modeling language called metamodeling language. Its conceptual foundation is captured in a model called metametamodel. Terminal models, metamodels, and metametamodel form a three-level architecture with levels respectively named M1, M2, and M3. MDE promotes unification by models like object technology proposed in the eighties unification by objects [1]. The principles of MDE may be implemented in several standards.[En la presentación del equipo]

El conjunto de herramientas combina en este momento experimentación, investigación, y trabajo en producción real:

Completely specializing on advanced model engineering, the AtlanMod research team is well known for its toolbox (AmmA for AtlanMod Model Management Architecture), including in particular the widely used ATL transformation language (AtlanMod Transformation Language). Since these tools have been made available on the Eclipse.org platform, there are an important number of organizations, academic or industrial, that are currently using these tools. AtlanMod has been a key international actor in the development of the model transformation area, publishing the first papers and creating the reference conference on the subject (ICMT for International Conference on Model Transformation). AtlanMod participates in the major international, European, and national projects on MDE like Carroll, ModelWare, ModelPlex, TopCased, OpenEmbeDD, OpenDevFactory, Lambda, FLFS, IDM++, Happy/Gaja, etc. In addition to these, ATL has been used in a number of other projects, including international projects and activities supported by several French clusters. AtlanMod has demonstrated that, with a small team, it was possible to achieve high impact by keeping a precise focus and of course by getting a lot of collaboration through open source projects (Eclipse).

Este trabajo en progreso es de un alcance mayor a MDA, estableciendo puentes con otros estilos de desarrollo basado en modelos. La diversidad de puntos de vista es un motivo que promueve un nivel por encima de los distintos estilos, y la posibilidad de extender las potencialidades de la automatización de análisis y generación es otra razón para este punto de vista. Uno de los papeles que explican su punto de vista, "Applying Megamodelling to Model Driven Performance Engineering", desarrolla un caso real aplicado al análisis y ajuste de la performance de un modelo. Una revisión de este trabajo puede dar una idea de las posibilidades que AmmA ofrece.