[news.eclipse.modeling.gmt.amw] Re: Bridge between Domain Specific Langu

[Marcos Didonet Del Fabro <marcos.didonet-del-fabro@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hi,

The idea of this use case is to show the possibility of applying AMW and ATL for such 
solutions. However, it is partially implemented (as indicated), so there are improvements 
that should be done, for instance, to handle the issues that you mentioned.

The M2M approach is ideal to manually develop the transformations. I agree that you can 
have a fast first result for your specific case.

Model weaving is interesting specially you need to reuse the mappings you define. The main 
issue is always the definition of the kind of mappings, because it is a design task that 
requires a good knowledge of the domain.


Concerning the versions, the previous releases are not 'unstable'. They are stable release 
versions, but they do not reflect all the latest functionalities.

The 'mwplugins-stable.zip' is generated using ATL from the CVS of April 25th. This version 
is the last build that we generated, so it is the closest one to the CVS versions.

So far, we just tested with Eclipse 3.2.1, not yet with 3.3x. What kind of problems do you 
have?

Regards,

Marcos.


SKuhn wrote:
> hi, I found some time to look at the sources of the use case.
> It looks like plain M2M Transformation is simpler than using AMW for 
> profiles :(. Especially the profile definition in TCS and the 
> proof-of-concept status with the need of adding some lines in the 
> generated xml-files gives me a bad taste, don't you agree?
>
> -stefan
>
> P.S. I'm still wondering why mwplugins-stable.zip don't work with 
> eclipse (3.3M4 nor 3.2) and why the 'unstable'
>  mwplugins-20070330.zip is the only one I could get to work with eclipse 
> 3.2.
>
>
> Marcos Didonet Del Fabro schrieb:
> > Hello,
> >
> >
> > Some comments about your issues:
> >
> > 1.
> >
> > AMW is a workbench that supports generic mapping management. The 
> > workbench is stable. It can be extended to be used for different 
> > mapping tasks, for instance to map between DSLs and UML profiles.
> >
> > In the DSL2Profile use case, we develop a weaving model which is a 
> > mapping between a UML profile and a DSL for MOF.
> >
> > This mapping table is equivalent to the situation illustrated in your 
> > figure in the "Connecting DSL-eCore w/ UML2" post. This means AMW 
> > could be used to develop such mappings.
> >
> > 2.
> >
> > In this use case we do not handle possible data loss issues. One 
> > possibility would be to create an auxiliary model that is generated in 
> > the same time you transform a Profile into a DSL. The transformation 
> > that translates the model back should handle this auxiliary model as 
> > well.
> >
> > 3.
> >
> > If I understood well, the event-based approach means that when you 
> > modify one element in the UML model, the equivalent element is 
> > automatically updated in the DSL, right?
> > The transformations are typically developed to translate a whole input 
> > model into a whole output model. So, even if you have an event that 
> > triggers one transformation, it would regenerate the output model 
> > entirely.
> > An alternative would be to create a weaving model with the mapping 
> > links and to create a component that interprets these links (and that 
> > does the event-based modifications).
> >
> >
> > Regards,
> >
> > Marcos.
> >
> >
> > SKuhn wrote:
> > > hi folks,
> > >
> > > I have a similar use case as described in 
> > > http://www.eclipse.org/gmt/amw/usecases/umlprofiles/.
> > >
> > > In short terms I want to work on an UML Model, translating every 
> > > DSL-Class to an UML Class with a stereotype of a self-defined 
> > > UML-profile (lightweight) and back. It should look for my GMF-DSL 
> > > Editor that he's working on his DSL-Metamodel (described in ecore).
> > >
> > > Now I have some concerns using AMW:
> > >
> > > 1. Is AMW ready for productive use?
> > > 2. How can I handle possible data loss for UML Elements that are not 
> > > representable in MyDSL-MM? I still want to read/write UML Models  (or 
> > > UML conform XMI files) leaving unrecongnized uml-elements unchanged.
> > > 3. Is it possible to run the corresponding transformations (EMF) 
> > > event based? Thereby I could have both models in sync resulting in 
> > > the option to open Eclipse UML2 editor and my own GMF-DSL-Editor at 
> > > the same time and work on the same model without versioning 
> > > conflicts. (optional)
> > >
> > > Right now I'm not sure if AMW is the right way. If you want to take a 
> > > closer look on my set-up / point-of-view, I already described my 
> > > problem in detail in "Connecting DSL-eCore w/ UML2"  at
> > > eclipse.tools.emf    as well as
> > > eclipse.modeling.gmt    as well as
> > > eclipse.modeling.mdt.uml2tools    as well as
> > > eclipse.modeling.mdt.uml2.
> > >
> > >
> > > Yours sincerly
> > >     stefan