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Vol: 52(66) No: 2 / June 2007        

SmartFactory – Validation Framework for Meta-Modeling in Software Engineering
Emanuel Tundrea
“Politehnica” University of Timisoara, Department of Computer Science, V. Parvan no 2, Timisoara, Romania, e-mail: emanuel@emanuel.ro
Philippe Lahire
Laboratoire I3S (CNRS-UNSA), University of Nice "Sophia Antipolis", 2000 Route des Lucioles, BP121, Sophia-Antipolis, France, e-mail: Philippe.Lahire@unice.fr
Dan Pescaru
“Politehnica” University of Timisoara, Department of Computer Science, V. Parvan no 2, Timisoara, Romania, e-mail: dan@cs.upt.ro
Ciprian-Bogdan Chirila
“Politehnica” University of Timisoara, Department of Computer Science, V. Parvan no 2, Timisoara, Romania, e-mail: chirila@cs.upt.ro


Keywords: software, model, prototype, factory, generative programming.

Abstract
We have to acknowledge an important principle in software engineering: in the world of software everything evolves: technologies, methodologies and applications. The complexity of a system is not usually found inside components or at their interfaces, but errors are more likely to be found in the interactions among software components. This is one of the main concerns of the Object-Oriented Programming principles which did not cure important issues faced by software companies these days on developing complex software for reuse and protecting the more and more evolving applications against technological obsolescence. The Model-Driven Architecture (MDA) project from OMG promotes the use of meta-modeling in order to drive the system’s design and implementation. In this context the paper presents: an approach that reviews the SmartModels briefly, introducing its principles, basic entities and main elements when defining a business-model; a prototype named SmartFactory which is based on Eclipse platform and its role is to validate the new approach. It addresses the paradigm of how to practically implement MDA principles and rules for software engineering. Therefore, it deals with important implementation issues based on Eclipse Platform.

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