Deriving detailed design models from an aspect-oriented ADL using MDD
Mónica Pinto∗, Lidia Fuentes, Luis Fernández
The Journal of Systems and Software 85 (2012) 525– 545

Abstract:
Software architects can separate crosscutting concerns more appropriately by using an aspect-oriented
ADL, concretely AO-ADL. This paper illustrates how aspect-orientation and model-driven development
technologies can be used to enhance the system design phase; by automatically deriving detailed
designs that take into account the “aspects” identified at the architectural level. Specifically, we have
defined model-to-model transformation rules to automatically generate either aspect-oriented or objectoriented
UML 2.0 models, closing the gap between ADLs and the notations used at the detailed design
phase. By using AO-ADL it is possible to specify separately crosscutting concerns and base functionality.
Another advantage of using AO-ADL is that it allows the specification of parameterizable architectures,
promoting the definition of architectural templates. AO-ADL, then, enforces the specification of crosscutting
concerns as separate architectural templates, which can be later instantiated and integrated with
the core functionality of the system being developed. The AO-ADL language and the transformation rules
from AO-ADL to UML 2.0 are available throughout the AO-ADL Tool Suite, which can be used to progressively
refine and elaborate aspect-oriented software architectures. These refined architectures are the
starting point of the detailed design phase. This means that our approach provides support to automatically
generate a skeleton of the detailed design that preserves the information about the crosscutting
and the non-crosscutting functionalities identified and modelled at the architecture level.

Keywords: Aspect-oriented software development, Software architectures, AO-ADL, Theme/UML, UML 2.0, Model-driven development, ATL

1. Introduction
Architecture description languages (ADLs)
the current status of ADLs: ADLs are not extensively used
the reason:

the organization of this paper:
1) Sect.2 describes related work on MDD and AOSD
2) Sect.3 discuss the motivation for using AO-ADL at the architectural level instead of modelling the whole system using UML 2.0
3) Sect.4 provides an overview of the use of MDD to close the gap between software architecture and design
4) Sect.5 provides the details by a running example.
5) Sect.6 describes the technical details, including the AO-ADL Tool Suite.
6) Sect.7 presents the quantitative and qualitative evaluation of our approach, as well as the discussion of interesting issues concerning MDD that were identified during its implementation
7) Sect.8 presents our conclusions.

2. Related work
2.1. Model-driven development

3. Motivation

4. Our MDD process

5. A step by step example

5.2. Transformation to Theme/UML

6. Technical details

7. Evaluation of our approach

7.1. Practical experience and quantitative evaluation of our approach

7.1.1. Comparison between AO-ADL and Theme/UML

7.1.2. Comparison between AO-ADL and UML 2.0


8. Conclusions
 

Deriving detailed design models from an aspect-oriented ADL using MDD.pdf