Specifying and Recognizing Model Changes in Networks of Models

基于模型的软件开发已经成为一种被广泛接受的方法，用于嵌入式系统和软件必须可维护和长期生存的应用领域。模型在其生命周期中会不断变化，并有许多版本。对模型中变化的描述和识别是理解和管理基于模型的系统演化的关键。然而，当前可用的版本控制工具在低级别上操作，有时是特定于工具的模型表示。由此产生的差异往往是不可理解的。如何使用高级编辑操作（例如，由现代重构工具提供的）来呈现和处理模型差异并分析模型的演变，这在很大程度上是一个开放的问题。编辑和版本控制工具的紧密集成需要一致的编辑操作规范;这种集成是另一个悬而未决的问题。这个项目通过不断地将模型版本化概念、技术和工具从低级别提升到高级别的模型更改来解决这两个问题。所有的概念都应通过图形转换概念进行形式化，以便对复杂的模型修改及其相互关系进行推理。我们的方法将在广泛使用的Eclipse建模项目的基础上实现和评估。

Model-based software development has become a widely accepted approach for embedded systems and in application domains where software must be maintainable and long-living. Models are subject to continuous change and have many versions during their lifetime. The specification and recognition of changes in models is the key to understand and manage the evolution of a model-based system. However, currently available versioning tools operate on low-level, sometimes tool-specific model representations. The resulting differences are often not understandable. It is a largely open problem how to use high-level edit operations, e.g. as offered by modern refactoring tools, to present and handle model differences and to analyse the evolution of models. The tight integration of editing and versioning tools requires consistent specifications of edit operations; this integration is another open problem. This project adresses both problems by consistently lifting model versioning concepts, techniques, and tools from low-level to high-level model changes. All concepts shall be formalized by graph transformation concepts in order to reason about complex model modifications and their inter-relations. Our approach will be implemented and evaluated based on the widely used Eclipse Modeling Project.