Re: [m2m-atl-dev] Feature proposal: ATL research VM with built-in compos

[Dennis Wagelaar <dennis.wagelaar@xxxxxxxxx>]

Dear fellow ATL devs,

The EMFTVM research VM has evolved a bit already, and the first bugs (discovered during TTC 2011) have already been addressed:
- 351281: EMFTVM Launch config doesn't handle unsetting "allow inter-model references"
- 351291: EMFTVM: Cannot combine ATL output models with SimpleGT in/out models 

Also, debugging support has been added to EMFTVM, so you can debug your ATL transformations they way you're used to. Two important features are still missing:

1. ATL grammar/metamodel support for multiple inheritance: the ATL parser will not accept multiple super-rules
2. Refining mode: the current compiler has no rules to compile refining mode yet

Feature 1 requires a change in the ATL metamodel and TCS definition, as well as a re-generated parser. It also requires updated versions of the regular ATL compilers to throw an error on multiple super-rule definition (compilers need to be updated and run through ACG). The EMFTVM compiler needs a trivial update, as super-rule declarations are simply copied from ATL to EMFTVM format.

Feature 2 requires a change in the EMFTVM compiler. The plan is to use in-place transformation in EMFTVM to implement refining mode. EMFTVM in-place transformation uses in/out models that can be read and written. This means that EMFTVM will not prevent the user from reading any elements that were generated during the transformation, which is something we'll want to address. As another consequence, the tracing model will only contain the actual in-place manipulations done by EMFTVM. We'll have to see if this is sufficient. Also, the launch dialog needs to be changed to allow a "save as.." option for in/out models.

Your thoughts on this are always welcome! Source code is available in CVS (org.eclipse.m2m.atl.emftvm.* plug-ins), but EMFTVM is also available as an ATL add-on feature via http://soft.vub.ac.be/eclipse/update-3.6/

Kind regards,
Dennis Wagelaar