Domain-Specific Languages: Effective Modeling, Automation, and Reuse

494 Pages·2023·12.899 MB·

by  Andrzej Wąsowski, Thorsten Berger

Andrzej Wąsowski
Thorsten Berger
Domain-Specific
Languages
Effective Modeling, Automation,
and Reuse
Domain-Specific Languages
Andrzej Wąsowski • Thorsten Berger
Domain-Specific
Languages
Effective Modeling, Automation, and Reuse
AndrzejWąsowski ThorstenBerger
Department of Computer Science Faculty of Computer Science
IT University of Copenhagen Ruhr University Bochum
Copenhagen, Denmark Bochum, Germany
ISBN 978-3-031-23668-6 ISBN 978-3-031-23669-3 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-23669-3
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Foreword
AShinyNewDSLTextbookinTown
Advanced textbooks are crucial inmaturing fields incomputer science. Inthis
sense,WasowskiandBerger’sbookmakesasignificantcontributiontomaturingthe
notionofDSL1inacontemporaryway;thebookalsosendsSLE2onanimpressive,
cross-technologicalspacemission.
AyoungerRalfwasslightlyobsessedwithPL3textbooksandIfoundeachof
thosebooksbackthentobeimportantincomplementaryways.Forexample,Iwas
fondofCarlA.A.Gunter’s1992bookonsemanticsduetoitselegantmathematical
approach. I loved Peter Mosses’ 2005 book on action semantics for its clever
“ontology”oflanguageconcepts.IalsodiscoveredBenjaminC.Pierce’s2002TAPL
book with great relief, as it was moving the meta-theoretical realm from art to
scienceorengineering.TheDSLbookathandis,ofcourse,moreofanSE4thana
PLbook,butit’sabitofahybridbecauseit’satrueSLEbook.
Everyone should rest assured that we need several books to cover the field
of SLE and, more specifically, the field of DSLs. The DSL topic is covered
somewhat by scholarly articles, surveys, and PhD theses. There isn’t enough
available in textbook form. Anneke Kleppe’s 2008 book “Software Language
Engineering:CreatingDomain-SpecificLanguagesUsingMetamodels”wasagood
startingpoint. ComparedwiththeDSLbookathand,Kleppe’sbookisoutdated,
highlytechnologicalspace-specific(i.e.,oneofvariantofMDE5),andincomplete.
Kleppe’sbooklacks, forexample, coverageoffoundations, detailedguidelines
for QA6, exercises, and further reading pointers, when compared to Wasowski
andBerger’sbookathand. MarkusVölteretal.’s2013book“DSLEngineering:
Designing,ImplementingandUsingDomain-SpecificLanguages”ismoreup-to-
dateandmorecomprehensive,butit’salsodrivenbyspecifictechnologiesandit
doesnotservetheclassroom.
Thereisalsomyown2018textbook“SoftwareLanguages:Syntax,Semantics,
and Metaprogramming” (for short “the SL book”) which is somewhat close to
WasowskiandBerger’sbookathand—bothfromacommunityperspectiveand
intermsofstructureandcontents,buttherearepowerfuldifferences. Acrucial
advancementofWasowskiandBerger’sbookisthatitpresentsamodernnotionof
1DSL:DomainSpecificLanguage
2SLE:SoftwareLanguageEngineering
3PL:ProgrammingLanguage
4SE:SoftwareEngineering
5MDE=MD(S)E:ModelDriven(Software)Engineering
6QA:QualityAssurance
v
vi Domain-SpecificLanguages
DSLcomprehensivelyfromanSEpointofview;italsorealizesanimportantcom-
ponentoftheSLEmission:bringtogetherthedistincttechnologicalspacesPLand
MDE(grammarwareversusmodelwareoralgebraicdatatypesversusmeta-models).
Iwholeheartedlywelcomethisnewbookandcherishitsoriginalqualities;see
thedetaileddiscussionbelow.
StructureoftheDSLBook
LetmestartwithabriefrecapoftheDSLbook’sstructure.
• Chapters1and2introducetoandmotivatetheDSLsubject.Thefirstchapter
tiesupDSLswithMDEandthesecondchaptersummarizesthelife-cycleof
realizingmodelinglanguages/DSLs—withthe“modelinglanguageshat”on.
• Chapter3,perhapsunsurprisingly,kicksofftheDSLdevelopmentlife-cyclewith
“abstractsyntax.”Inadditiontotheobviousformalisticaspects,considerable
emphasisisplacedon“domainanalysis.”Forexample:Whataretheconcepts
thattheDSLneedstoaddress? WhatI’dliketocallSLE-style“technological
spaceliberation”startsnolaterthanhere. Thatis,it’sgreattoseehowmeta-
modeling(MDE)andalgebraicdatatypes(PL)aredemonstratedasalternative
pathstowards(abstract)syntaxmodelingandimplementation.
• Chapter4,quitelogically,addresses“concretesyntax.” Justliketheprevious
chapter,themeta-meta-leveliscovered.(Thanks!)Thechapteralsogetsquite
seriousongrammarengineering.Forinstance,itcoverssyntax-orientedtesting
andleft-recursionremoval. (Iloveit!) Twodistinguishedpaths—theonevia
aparsergenerator(intheMDEsetting)andtheotherviaaparser-combinator
library(inthePLsetting)—areexercised. Insummary,boththePLandMDE
pointofviewregardingconcretesyntaxareservedbacktoback.(Isubmit:To
countasaSLE/DSLengineerin2022,youcertainlyneedtohandleabstractand
concretesyntaxacrosstechnologicalspaces.)
• Chapters5and6cover“staticsemantics”whilemanagingtheidentificationof
twolayers:onewithinvolvementoftypesystemshigherup(andmoreintricate)
andonewithjustmorebasicconstraints(àla“well-formedness”)asastarting
point.Formalistically,staticsemanticsispresentedasalogicalconstraintproblem
wherePLandMDErealizationsaredemonstrated.Forinstance,Scalacanencode
constraintsonalgebraicdatatypesandUML’sOCLcanexpressconstraintson
meta-models.
• Chapters7to9cover“dynamicsemantics.”Morespecifically,Chapters7(Trans-
formation),8(Interpretation),and9(Generation)developdifferentparadigms
forthedesignandtheimplementationofdynamicsemanticswhilealsocovering
testingandothertypesofQAforsuchcomponents.Again,bothPL(e.g.,Scala)
andMDE(e.g.,ATL)areexercised. Chapter10focusesonanimportantPL-
specificclassofDSLimplementationoptions—internalDSLs—thatleverage
meta-programming;boththedeepandshallowoptionsarecovered.
• Thebookexercisesanumberofdomains,forexample,robotics,butChapters11
to13engagewithadistinguisheddomain:“variability”insoftwaredevelopment,
whichisindeeda(DSL!)domaininsofarthatvariabilityapproachestendtouse
DSLsforconfiguration. Asabonus,thebookrehashesthecentralunderlying
notionsof“softwareproductline”and“featuremodeling.”Inthelastchapter,the
bookliftsvariabilitytothelanguagelevel,therebyarrangingDSLsin“linguistic
productlines”.(Thisisgreat!)
Foreword vii
OriginalQualitiesoftheDSLBook
• TheDSLbookshowsarichPLapproach(i.e.,Scalawithalgebraicdatatypes
+libraries)andthede-factostandardMDEapproach(i.e.,EMFandfriends)back
toback.(Admittedly,mySLbookisabitmoreofaPLbook.)
• TheDSL/SLE/MDEfieldsarequiterichregardingtechnologiesandformalisms
(“notations”)sothatatextbookcouldeasilydrowninformalisticmattersand
idiosyncrasies. However,theauthorsdoagreatjobabstractingfromthetech-
nologieschosenforillustration;theauthorsalsomixincoverageofsoftparts,
forexample,requirementsordomainanalysisorthe“biggerpicture”interms
ofmeta-meta-levelconsiderationsandmulti-levelmodelingviews.
• The authors spell out QA guidelines and methods for each and every DSL
componentdesignedandimplemented.Thiscoveragegoesbeyondsimpleunit
testing(e.g.,fortransformations);itcoversarangeofproperties,forexample,
robustness,well-formedness,completeness,andcorrectness. (Admittedly,my
SLbookdoesnotdiscussQAsobroadly.)
• Infact,thebookisgenerallyengineering-oriented(i.e.,SE-oriented)inthatit
systematicallyexercisesproblem-orientedthinkingofsoftwareengineerswhile
itdrivesthereadertowardsmappingproblemsto“standardized”solutionswithin
thePLandMDEspaces.Asmentionedbefore,thesolutionspaceschosen—Scala
versusEMF—arediscussedatagoodlevelofabstraction.Thus,thereadercan
imaginealternativesolutions.(Forinstance,thingsmakesenseformeasarusty
Haskellprogrammer.)
• On top of strong coverage of the topics of transformation and interpretation,
theauthorsdevelopthegenerationtopicinanexceptionallystrongmanner.In
particular,theyexplainsystematically,howandwhy(!) tomixtemplatesand
recursionandhowtoreuseanexistinginterpreterforarrivingatagenerator.
(Thisisveryinsightful!)Further,theauthorsdon’tfallintothetrapofengaging
intoacompilerconstruction-likeoptimizationdiscussion.
• Thebookmakesgooduseofexamplecodeandcasestudies.Itusessimpletoy
examplestodevelopthebasicskills.Itscalesuptomoresignificantcasestudies
tocoverdifferentDSLdomainsandtoprovethescalabilityofthemethodology.
Therunningroboticsthemeisdefinitelyfunformostreaders. Ultimately,the
bookengagesinthe“variability”domain;seeabove.Allexamplecodefromthe
bookisavailablefordownload!
• Thebookisclearlyclassroom-andlearning-orientedinthatthewritingstyleis
skill-drivenandthereareloadsofexercisesthatdirectlyconnecttothedeveloped
examples. Thisamazinglevelofexercisesupportremindsmeoftextbooksin
mathematics.(Solutionstotheexercisesaren’t(yet)availableonline.)Thebook
isalsoimmediatelyfitforresearch-oriented(≥M.Sc.level)coursesinthatitpro-
videsreferencestounderlyingresearchfoundationsandfurther-readingmaterial.
ReadingNeverStops
TheDSLbookisaperfecttestamentofhowtheMDE,PL,andSEcommunitieshave
growntogetheratthepivotalfrontofSLE.Theauthorshaveaverystrongstandingin
theSEandMDEfieldswithsignificantengagementsborder-liningtoPL.TheSLE
community,“bydesign”(see[1]),aimsatsuchcommunityintegrationforthebest
viii Domain-SpecificLanguages
ofsoftwarelanguages(DSLsverymuchincluded!)onanengineeringfront.The
authors’furtherreadingpointers,perchapter,servewelltomaintainandimprove
thefurtherintegrationofthefieldsbothintermsoffoundationsandengineering.
MyownbackgrounddiffersabitfromtheoneoftheauthorsinthatIammore
ofaPL,grammarware,compilerandprogramtransformationperson.Also,more
recently,Ihaveturnedintoa“megamodeling”aficionado. Accordingly,Iwould
liketosubmitafewfurtherreadingpointersthat,inmyview,logicallycontinue
thedirectionsgiveninthebook. Pleaseacceptmyapologiesfortheuseofself-
references;theassumptionisherethattheself-referencedpapersdiscussorreference
alsofundamentalworkbyothers.
• ModelgenerationpopsupanumberoftimesintheDSLbookinthecontextof
testing-basedQAforrobustnessorcorrectness,forexample,whentestingmodel
transformations.Moreoftheresultsofgrammar-basedtest-datageneration[7]
(e.g., regarding coverage criteria, use cases regarding code generation, and
coverageofsemanticconstraints)canbeincorporatedintotheDSLengineering
methodology.Also,generationofgraph-shapeddata,whichthebookunderstand-
ablyidentifiesasmorecomplexthangenerationoftree-shapeddata,hasbeen
researchedinthe(OO)programmingcontext[9].
• Muchofthevariability-inspiredreusediscussioninChapters11to13isfocused
on andtailored tomodels (e.g., howto supportvariabilityin models), while
reuse of semantics is largely covered in the sense of “interpreters and code
generators are programs, too” and can be thus turned into software product
lines.Thereis,however,agreathistoryofreuse(modularity,de-/composition)
forlanguagedefinitionsand,specifically,semanticsdescriptions,forexample,
actionsemantics[11],ModularSOS[10],transformationalapproaches[4,3],
andparadigmshiftsforattributegrammars[6,8].OnemightarguethatthePL
field(includinglanguagedefinitionandimplementation)hashadfeaturemodels
andproductlinesforlanguagedefinitionsforalongtime.
• TheDSLbookexercisesthenotionsof“meta-modelinghierarchy”and“language-
conformancehierarchy”tocapturethelinguisticarchitectureofDSLsolutions.
(Iverymuchappreciatethisengagement!)Thistypeofdiscussionisaninstance
ofthemoregeneralparadigmof“megamodeling”or“linguisticarchitecture”[2,
5],whichbyitsfurtherdevelopmentanddeploymentcouldhelpinformalizing
DSL methodology in an executable manner. For instance, we could explain
bootstrappingmorerigorouslybymeansofmegamodeling,whencomparedto
what’sdoneinthetextbookathand.
FinalVerdict
IconcurwiththegreatestGermancomedian,OttoWaalkes,whosays(Itranslate):
“Thereisatrendtowardsasecondbook.”7 AssumingthatmySLbookisalreadyin
yourlibrary,youwilldefinitelywanttoaddtheDSLbookbyWasowskiandBerger.
Alljokesaside,thenewDSLbookbyWasowskiandBergerismostdefinitelya
greattextbookcoveringtheDSLtopic—ratherthanthelessclearlydemarcated
7InGerman:“DerTrendgehtzumZweitbuch.”Itappearsthatthephraseexpressesfearofthe
opinionsoftheilliteratemanwhohasonlyreadasinglebook.Historically,thatsinglebook
mayhavebeen“the”bible.
Foreword ix
SL topic—in a profound manner, while also conveying importance of the DSL
topic in today’s software development practice. This book excels in delivering
state-of-the-artSEresearchtoteaching(learning)andSEpractice.Finally,thisDSL
bookisagreatSLEbook,too.
RalfLämmel
ProfessorofComputerScience(SoftwareLanguages)
UniversityofKoblenz
[email protected]
AuthoroftheSoftwareLanguagesBook,http://www.softlang.org/book
References
[1] Jean-Marie Favre, Dragan Gasevic, Ralf Lämmel, and Andreas Winter.
“Guesteditors’introductiontothespecialsectiononsoftwarelanguageen-
gineering”.In:IEEETrans.Soft.Eng.35.6(2009),pp.737–741(cit.p.vii).
[2] FrédéricJouault,BertVanhooff,HugoBrunelière,GuillaumeDoux,Yolande
Berbers,andJeanBézivin.“Inter-dslcoordinationsupportbycombining
megamodeling and model weaving”. In: ACM Symposium on Applied
Computing(SAC).2010(cit.p.viii).
[3] RalfLämmel.“Declarativeaspect-orientedprogramming”.In:Proceedings
ofthe1999ACMSIGPLANWorkshoponPartialEvaluationandSemantics-
BasedProgramManipulation.TechnicalreportBRICS-NS-99-1.University
ofAarhus,1999,pp.131–146(cit.p.viii).
[4] RalfLämmel.“Evolutionofrule-basedprograms”.In:J.Log.Algebraic
MethodsProgram.60-61(2004),pp.141–193(cit.p.viii).
[5] RalfLämmel.“Relationshipmaintenanceinsoftwarelanguagereposito-
ries”.In:ArtSci.Eng.Program.1.1(2017),p.4(cit.p.viii).
[6] RalfLämmelandGünterRiedewald.“Reconstructionofparadigmshifts”.
In: 2nd Int. Workshop on Attribute Grammars and their Applications,
WAGA’99.1999(cit.p.viii).
[7] RalfLämmelandWolframSchulte.“Controllablecombinatorialcoveragein
grammar-basedtesting”.In:TestingofCommunicatingSystems,18thIFIP
TC6/WG6.1InternationalConference,TestCom2006.Vol.3964.Lecture
NotesinComputerScience.Springer,2006(cit.p.viii).
[8] JohannesMeyetal.“Relationalreferenceattributegrammars:improving
continuousmodelvalidation”.In:J.Comput.Lang.57(2020),p.100940
(cit.p.viii).
[9] AleksandarMilicevic,SasaMisailovic,DarkoMarinov,andSarfrazKhur-
shid.“Korat:Atoolforgeneratingstructurallycomplextestinputs”.In:
29thInternationalConferenceonSoftwareEngineering(ICSE2007).IEEE
ComputerSociety,2007(cit.p.viii).
[10] PeterD.Mosses.“Modularstructuraloperationalsemantics”.In:J.Log.
AlgebraicMethodsProgram.60-61(2004),pp.195–228(cit.p.viii).
[11] PeterD.Mosses.“Theoryandpracticeofactionsemantics”.In:Mathemati-
calFoundationsofComputerScience,MFCS’96.Vol.1113.LectureNotes
inComputerScience.Springer,1996(cit.p.viii).
Preface
Whatisadomain-specificlanguage(DSL)?Howdoweusemodelingforbuilding
systemseffectively?Howaredomain-specificlanguagesrelevantinpractice?How
complex and expensive is developing languages? Does model-driven software
engineering(MDSE)imposeawaterfallprocesswithmuchoverhead? Canitbe
iterative,agile,test-driven? Thisbookattemptstoanswertheseandmanyother
questionsinaformatthatissuitableforacademicteachingandlearning.Wehave
designeditaroundthreeprinciples: soundpedagogy,groundinginresearch,and
beingnon-sectarianregardingprogrammingparadigms.
Pedagogy. We develop a skill-oriented, operational, and experiential approach
rootedinScandinavianeducationaltradition. Wedonotwanttotellyouabout
DSLsandMDSE.WewantyoutopracticebuildingDSLs,atyourkeyboard,in
yourproblemdomain,usingyourfavoriteprogramminglanguage.Wemakeyou
manipulateandanalyzesoftwareartifactsautomatically,includingvalidationof
properties, modifying models or data, computing new artifacts out of existing
ones,orgeneratingcode. Weemphasizepracticaltake-homelessons,including
toolbox-likedesignguidelines,oftenderivedfromempiricalresearchbyothers.
Tofacilitateconstructivelearning,wetrytoavoidpresentingconceptswithout
examplesandexercises. Wedevelopeddozensofconcreteandreproducibleex-
amples,fittingeachintoasmallfigure,presentingkeyconceptswithoutexcessive
noise. Thiswasachallengeinitself,aslanguageprojectstendtobetoolargeto
presentconcisely.Still,ourexamplesuseconcretemoderntechnology.Wefocuson
toolsthatareaccessibleforprofessionaluse,stable,andnotcontroversialtoadopt.
Weprioritizelanguage-engineeringfeaturesavailableinmainstreamprogramming
languagesoveracademicsolutionsclosertoourdailyresearchwork.Wehavealso
designed277exercises,mostfocusingontrainingasingleskill. Webelievethat
establishingfine-grainedexercisesisasteppingstoneindevelopingapedagogyof
anytechnicalfield.Wehopethatthecommunitywillrecognizethiscontribution.
Tothebestofourknowledge,thisisthefirstbookthatsystematicallydiscusses
practicesoftestinglanguagedesignsandmodel-drivensystems. Thiscontentis
distributedthroughoutallthechapters;qualityassuranceinasoftwareprojectis
notanadd-on,whichcouldbedelegatedtoadedicatedchapterasanafterthought,
butsomethingweneedtopracticethroughouttheproject. Thebook’sexercise
collectionalsoincorporatestasksontestingandotherqualityassurancepractices.
Researchfoundation. Topreventtheskill-orientationfromhamperingthedura-
bilityofthecontents,wecounterbalanceitwithafocusonfundamentalconcepts
andprinciples. Wegroundthetextinprogramming-languageandmodel-driven-
engineeringresearch,avoidingbuzzwordsandacronyms.Eachchapterconcludes
withanoverviewoftherelatedliterature,commentingonkeypapersandbooks.It
directsstudentsandearly-stageresearchersworkingonthesesandresearchprojects
totherelevantliteratureofthefield.Ifyouseekabookthatwillquicklyteachyou
touseaparticularlibrary,framework,ortool,thenstopreadingnow.Wewantyou
xi