Eclipse Modeling Project: A Domain-Specific Language (DSL) Toolkit

Eclipse Modeling Project: A Domain-Specific Language (DSL) Toolkit

by Richard C. Gronback
Released March 2009
Publisher(s): Addison-Wesley Professional
ISBN: None

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Book description

Achieve Breakthrough Productivity and Quality with MDD and Eclipse-Based DSLs

Domain-specific languages (DSLs) and model-driven development (MDD) offer software engineers powerful new ways to improve productivity, enhance quality, and insulate systems from rapid technological change. Now, there’s a pragmatic, start-to-finish guide to creating DSLs and using MDD techniques with the powerful open source Eclipse platform. In Eclipse Modeling Project, Richard C. Gronback illuminates both the principles and techniques software professionals need to master, offering insights that will be invaluable to developers working with any tool or platform.

As coleader of the Eclipse Modeling Project, Gronback is singularly well-positioned to demonstrate DSLs and MDD at work in Eclipse. Gronback systematically introduces each of the Eclipse technologies that can be used in DSL and MDD development. Throughout, he introduces key concepts and technologies in the context of a complete worked example and presents new best practices and never-before published techniques. He also covers Eclipse projects discussed in no other book, including Query/View/Transformation (QVT) and the Graphical Modeling Framework (GMF)–a project the author personally leads.

Eclipse Modeling Project gives software practitioners all the knowledge they need to explore the remarkable potential of DSLs and MDD–and includes coverage of

  • Why a model-based approach enables the rapid customization of high-quality solutions within the product line paradigm

  • How the Eclipse Modeling Project’s capabilities can be used to efficiently create new DSLs

  • Powerful techniques for developing DSL abstract syntax, graphical notation, and textual syntax

  • How to build Model-to-Model (M2M) and Model-to-Text (M2T) transformations–including a powerful new M2M implementation of the Object Management Group’s QVT Operational Mapping Language (OML)

  • Efficiently packaging and deploying DSLs with Eclipse

  • Complete reference sections for the Graphical Editing Framework (GEF), GMF runtime and tooling, QVT OML, Xpand, and more

    • Foreword     xix

    Preface     xxi

    Acknowledgments     xxiii

    About the Author     xxv

    Part I: Introduction     1

    Chapter 1: Introduction     3

    Chapter 2: Modeling Project as a DSL Toolkit     17

    Part II: Developing Domain-Specific Languages     27

    Chapter 3: Developing a DSL Abstract Syntax     29

    Chapter 4: Developing a DSL Graphical Notation     55

    Chapter 5: Developing a DSL Textual Syntax     227

    Chapter 6: Developing Model-to-Model Transformations     231

    Chapter 7: Developing Model-to-Text Transformations     277

    Chapter 8: DSL Packaging and Deployment     303

    Part III: Reference     315

    Chapter 9: Graphical Editing Framework     317

    Chapter 10: Graphical Modeling Framework Runtime     353

    Chapter 11: Graphical Modeling Framework Tooling     503

    Chapter 12: Graphical Modeling Framework FAQs     545

    Chapter 13: Query/View/Transformation Operational Mapping Language     549

    Chapter 14: Xpand Template Language     605

    Part IV: Appendixes     651

    Appendix A: Graphical Modeling Framework Key Bindings     653

    Appendix B: Model-Driven Architecture at Eclipse     661

    References     671

    Product information

    • Title: Eclipse Modeling Project: A Domain-Specific Language (DSL) Toolkit
    • Author(s): Richard C. Gronback
    • Release date: March 2009
    • Publisher(s): Addison-Wesley Professional
    • ISBN: None