Modeling and implementing software architecture with acme and archJava

ABSTRACT

Software architecture describes the high-level organization of a software system, and is essential both for reasoning about system properties and for implementing and evolving code. This poster describes two architecture-related tools: AcmeStudio for architectural modeling and analysis, and ArchJava for ensuring consistency between architecture and implementation. AcmeStudio is an architectural design tool based on Eclipse, supporting graphical and textual descriptions of software architecture as well as various forms of architectural analysis. The poster shows an example of creating an architecture in Acme and checking it against the constraints of an architectural style such as pipe-and-filter. ArchJava extends the Java language to include explicit architectural modeling constructs, and uses type system techniques to ensure that the implementation conforms to the architecture. The poster shows how AcmeStudio can generate skeleton ArchJava code, how developers can fill in this architecture with an implementation using an Eclipse-based ArchJava IDE, and how ArchJava's type system can help the developer to maintain consistency between code and architecture.

REFERENCES

• 1: Jonathan Aldrich , Craig Chambers , David Notkin, ArchJava: connecting software architecture to implementation, Proceedings of the 24th International Conference on Software Engineering, May 19-25, 2002, Orlando, Florida [doi>10.1145/581339.581365]
• 2: Bradley Schmerl , David Garlan, AcmeStudio: Supporting Style-Centered Architecture Development, Proceedings of the 26th International Conference on Software Engineering, p.704-705, May 23-28, 2004

INDEX TERMS

Primary Classification:
  D. Software
  D.2 SOFTWARE ENGINEERING
        D.2.11 Software Architectures
            Subjects: Languages (e.g., description, interconnection, definition)

General Terms:
Design, Documentation, Languages, Verification