This excellent overview was contributed by Woody Pidcock of the Boeing company. Many organizations and companies are struggling with these terms and the ideas behind them; this set of definitions will help to clarify.

Dear software practitioner,
During software development, we often experience problems regarding the compilability, quality (e.g., maintainability), or conformance of our software. With a model-driven approach such as MDSD (Model-Driven Software Development), we might work on a higher abstraction level ( i.e., software models), but we (will) still experience similar problems during the development of our software models.

Therefore, in the context of the VIDE project, we are conducting a survey about how software modeling environments should annotate software models in order to provide additional information about these problems. Our goal is to get feedback from you on several annotation concepts and your opinion about other characteristics of defect annotations.

Hence, we would like to invite you and members of your organization to participate in the survey at http://www.online-poll.de/uc/vide-ma/. Answering the survey should take about 20-30 minutes. The survey will close on 1 October 2007.

We will draw five winners from all participants who finalized the survey; they will get an Amazon gift certificate (either amazon.com or from a local site) for $50.

Please pass information about this survey on to your colleagues and managers as well as other contacts who might be interested in this topic.

Many thanks in advance,
Joerg Rech and Axel Spriestersbach

---
Joerg Rech
Project Manager and Scientist
Speaker of the GI-Workgroup on Architecture and Design Patterns

Fraunhofer Institute for Experimental Software Engineering (IESE)
Tel.: +49 (0) 631/6800-2210 email: joerg.rech (at) iese.fraunhofer.de
XING: http://www.xing.com/profile/Joerg_Rech/
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/joergrech

Dear software practitioner,
During software development, we often experience problems regarding the compilability, quality (e.g., maintainability), or conformance of our software. With a model-driven approach such as MDSD (Model-Driven Software Development), we might work on a higher abstraction level (i.e., software models), but we (will) still experience similar problems during the development of our software models.

Therefore, in the context of the VIDE project, we are conducting a survey about how software modeling environments should annotate software models in order to provide additional information about these problems. Our goal is to get feedback from you on several annotation concepts and your opinion about other characteristics of defect annotations.

Hence, we would like to invite you and members of your organization to participate in the survey at http://www.online-poll.de/uc/vide-ma/. Answering the survey should take about 20-30 minutes. The survey will close on 1 October 2007.

We will draw five winners from all participants who finalized the survey; they will get an Amazon gift certificate (either amazon.com or from a local site) for $50.

Please pass information about this survey on to your colleagues and managers as well as other contacts who might be interested in this topic.

Many thanks in advance,
Joerg Rech and Axel Spriestersbach

---
Joerg Rech
Project Manager and Scientist
Speaker of the GI-Workgroup on Architecture and Design Patterns

Fraunhofer Institute for Experimental Software Engineering (IESE)
Tel.: +49 (0) 631/6800-2210 email: joerg.rech (at) iese.fraunhofer.de
XING: http://www.xing.com/profile/Joerg_Rech/
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/joergrech

Call for Papers

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
3rd International Workshop on Graph and Model Transformation (GraMoT) Haifa, Israel June 12, 2007 http://www.mathematik.uni-marburg.de/~swt/gramot

A satellite event of the 3rd European Conference on Model-Driven Architecture 2007 http://www.haifa.il.ibm.com/conferences/ecmda2007/
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Graphs are a general kind of models which have been used in various fields of computer science. On one hand, they are well-suited to formally describe complex structures. On the other hand, the underlying structure of models, especially visual models, can be described best by graphs, due to their multidimensional extension. Graphs can be manipulated by graph transformation in a rule-based manner. Considering current trends in software development such as model driven development and model-integrated computing, there is an emerging need to describe model manipulations, model evolution, model semantics, etc. in a precise way. Recent research has shown that graph transformation is a promising formalism to specify model transformations.

The goal of the workshop is to foster interaction between the graph transformation and the model transformation community to facilitate exchange of results and challenge problems. The graph transformation research community has built up a significant body of knowledge over the past 30 years and in addition to the theoretical base several practical implementations have been created. The research area of model transformations has recently been identified as a key subject in model-driven development. We believe there is a need for strong interaction and inter-operation between these communities: the intellectual interchange of ideas, problems, and solutions will lead to major advances in both fields.

Anticipated submissions are either research or position papers and not more than 12 pages long. Research papers present new results from actual research which might be preliminary or intermediate, while position papers report on lessons learned or open model transformation problems. Topics of interest include, but are not restricted to:

- Graph transformation for the syntactical definition of model transformation languages
- Graph transformation as a tool to capture model transformation semantics
- Verification of model transformations based on graph transformation
- Novel concepts and results from graph transformations useful for model transformation
- Tool support for model transformation based on or inspired by graph transformation principles
- Comparison of graph transformation with other approaches to model transformation
- Novel application areas for graph transformation performing model transformation
- Problems in and limitations of model transformation where the use of graph transformation could help

Authors are invited to submit a title and abstract by March 19, 2007, and a full paper by March 26, 2007. Submissions are to be sent to the workshop organizers via email, in PDF or Postscript form. Simultaneous submission to other venues and submission of previously published material are not allowed. Electronic submission will be required, except by special arrangement with the program chairs. Authors will be notified of acceptance by April 23, 2007. Final, camera-ready versions of accepted papers must be submitted by May 15, 2007.

All submissions will undergo a review process by the program committee. The proceedings of this workshop will be published in the journal Electronic Communications of the EASST. A preliminary version of the proceedings will be available at the workshop. For preparing your manuscript, please use the ECEASST template for GraMoT'07 at http://www.easst.org/eceasst/template

Program Committee:
Krzysztof Czarnecki (Canada), Jeff Gray (United States), Martin Gogolla (Germany), Reiko Heckel (United Kingdom), Dirk Janssens (Belgium), Juan de Lara (Spain), Mark Minas (Germany), Mauro Pezze (Switzerland), Bernhard Rumpe (Germany), Andy Schuerr (Germany), Daniel Varro (Hungary), Albert Z|ndorf (Germany)

Workshop Organizers:
Gabor Karsai (United States)
Gabriele Taentzer (Germany)

Dear software practitioners, consultants, and researchers,
we are currently conducting an international survey about architecture and design patterns (on the code and model level). Our goal is to discover how familiar people are with these patterns (and anti-patterns) as well as to elicit the information need, the usage behavior, and the experience of software organizations regarding architecture patterns and design patterns.

Therefore, we would like to invite you and members of your organizations to participate in the survey at http://softwarepatterns.eu. Answering the survey should take about 20-30 minutes. The survey will close on 1 March 2007.

All data will be treated confidentially.

Please pass information about this survey on to your colleagues and managers as well as other contacts who might be interested in this topic and have experience with architecture and design patterns.

Many thanks in advance,
Joerg Rech

---
Joerg Rech
Speaker of the GI-Workgroup Architecture and Design Patterns (AKAEM)
Web: http://www.architekturmuster.de (in German)
XING: http://www.xing.com/profile/Joerg_Rech/

===========================================================================
MODELS 2007 -- First Call for Contributions

ACM/IEEE 10th International Conference on
Model-Driven Engineering Languages and Systems

September 30 - October 5, 2007
Nashville (TN), USA

http://www.modelsconference.org/
===========================================================================

The past decade has witnessed an explosion of interest in advanced
techniques for expressing design intent at a higher level of abstraction
than third-generation programming languages and keeping abstract models of
complex software systems in sync with the underlying code. MODELS 2007
(formerly the UML series of conferences) is the premier conference in
model-driven approaches to software development.

Scientific papers: We invite scientific research papers describing
innovative research on model-driven engineering and other aspects of
modeling in the development process.

Experience papers: We invite experience papers that focus on reporting
project experience with model-driven engineering.

Please visit the conference website http://www.modelsconference.org/ for
more information.


IMPORTANT DATES

Experience and Scientific Papers deadlines:
Abstracts: March 19, 2007
Submissions: April 2, 2007

Workshop Proposals deadline: April 2, 2007

Tutorial Proposals deadline: May 1, 2007

Doctoral and Educators Symposiums, Vendor Tools Exhibits, Academic
Posters and Demos, and Panels deadline: May 1, 2007

Submission guidelines are available from the website. Authors of best papers
from the conference will be invited to revise and submit extended versions
of their papers for publication consideration in a special issue of Software
and Systems Modeling (Springer). Proposals for advanced workshops, tutorials
and posters are requested.

CALL FOR CHAPTERS

CALL FOR CHAPTERS

Proposal Submission Deadline: December 1, 2006

See also http://www.softwaremodelle.de

Model-Driven Software Development:
Integrating Quality Assurance

A book edited by Joerg Rech and Christian Bunse,
Fraunhofer Institute for Experimental Software Engineering (IESE), Germany

Model-driven software development drastically alters the software development process, which is characterized by a high degree of innovation and productivity. Model-driven architectures (MDA) and model-driven software development (MDSD) focuses on the idea of constructing software systems not by programming in a specific programming language but by designing models that are translated into executable software systems by generators. These characteristics enable designers to deliver product releases within much shorter periods of time compared to the traditional methods. In theory, this process makes it unnecessary to care for an executable system’s quality, as it is "optimized" by the generators.

However, proponents of MDA must provide convincing answers to questions such as "What is the quality of the models and software produced?". The designed models are also a work product that requires a minimal set of quality aspects (e.g., the maintainability of models over a longer life-time). Quality assurance techniques such as testing, inspections, software analysis, or software measurement are well researched for programming languages, but their application in the domain of software models and model-driven software development is still in an embryonic phase. The goals of quality assurance for model-driven software development are diverse and include the improvement of quality aspects such as maintainability, reusability, security, or performance. Quality assurance for model-driven software development will play an important role for the future wide-spread usage of model-driven architectures in general, as well as in specific application domains.

This book aims at publishing original academic work and experience reports from industry related to quality assurance for model-driven software development (QAMDSD). The book’s mission is to give a clear description of the fundamentals in QAMDSD theory, to fill the gap in the literature, and to provide concrete results from software development organizations. Successful quality assurance for model-driven software development can help participants in the software development process avoid risks and project failures that are frequently encountered in traditional and agile software projects. The whole development process must be analyzed, measured, and validated from the quality point of view.

The area is wide and entails many facets that the book must clarify, including:

· Differences and similarities between the traditional and model-driven quality aspects,

· Identification of quality aspects in model-driven development,

· Model-driven design and development of high-quality software,

· Evaluation of quality in model-driven development,

· Reports on the state-of-the-art regarding quality in model-driven development,

· Investigation on how processes affect the quality in model-driven development.

Additionally, this book will provide a compendium of definitions and explanations of the main terms, concepts, and topics of quality assurance for model-driven software development.

Professionals and researchers working in the field of software engineering interested in Quality Assurance for Model Driven Software Development and the model-driven development process. The book will provide a comprehensive view of quality in Model Driven Development to project managers, developers, and researchers interested in promoting Quality Assurance for Model Driven Software Development. Moreover, the book will provide insights and support to academic teachers and students seeking a comprehensive tool for studying Quality Assurance for Model Driven Software Development.

Introductory Chapters

· State-of-the-art of quality assurance for model-driven software development

· Terminology of quality assurance for model-driven software development

Quality in model-driven software development related chapters

· Quality aspects in model-driven development (e.g., maintainability of models)

· Process metrics for model-driven development

· Product metrics for model-driven development

· Quality metrics for model-driven development

· Patterns and anti-patterns for model-driven development

· Model and architecture smells

· Performance, optimization, and tuning of models

Quality-oriented Construction of software Models related chapters

· Requirements for high-quality software Models

· Analysis and design for high-quality software Models

· Project management for high-quality software Models

· Testing in model-driven software development (Model-based Testing, Testing of Models, Model Validation)

· Inspections, review, walkthroughs or audits in MDSD

· Formal approaches for high-quality software models (Formal Languages, Model checking, Model Verification)

Quality-oriented Maintenance of High-quality software Models related chapters

· Refactoring of high-quality software models

· Re-engineering of high-quality software models

Ontologies, Semantics, Metadata and Data for MDSD related chapters

· Ontology development for high-quality software models

· Semantics, metadata and ontologies for high-quality software models

· Action languages supporting high-quality software models

Examples and Evidence related chapters

· Examples of high-quality software models

· Quality of model-driven development experiments and case studies

Miscellaneous related chapters

· Management of high-quality software models

· Standards and high-quality software models

· Teaching principles of quality assurance for model-driven software development

Outlook related chapters

· Trends in quality assurance for model-driven software development

· Quality assurance for model-driven software development in 5, 10, and 25 years

Researchers and practitioners are invited to submit on or before December 1, 2006, a 2-5 page manuscript proposal clearly explaining the mission and concerns of the proposed chapter. Authors of accepted proposals will be notified by January 15, 2007 about the status of their proposals and sent chapter organizational guidelines. Full chapters are expected to be submitted by May 15, 2007. All submitted chapters will be reviewed on a double-blind review basis. The book is scheduled to be published by Idea Group Inc., http://www.idea-group.com, publisher of the Idea Group Publishing, Information Science Publishing, IRM Press, CyberTech Publishing and Idea Group Reference imprints.

Inquiries and submissions can be forwarded electronically (Word, RTF, or PDF document) to:

Joerg Rech

Fraunhofer Institute for Experimental Software Engineering (IESE)

Fraunhofer-Platz 1, 67663 Kaiserslautern, Germany

Tel.: +49 631/6800-2210, Fax.: +49 631/6800-1599

email: joerg.rech@iese.fraunhofer.de

Proceedings and presentations slides of the 6th OOPSLA workshop on
Domain-Specific Modeling are available at
http://www.dsmforum.org/events/DSM06/.

This year more than half of the papers dealt with cases and practical
experiences on implementing domain-specific modeling languages. The
workshop had 22 papers and over 40 participants.

MUSE 2007 CfP

ICSOFT

Second International Workshop on Metamodelling

Utilization in Software Engineering

(MUSE 2007)

http://www.icsoft.org/MUSE.htm

Papers are invited for this workshop focussing on metamodelling issues as they pertain to software engineering. Some specific areas of interest are:

• Metamodelling and modelling theory
• Metamodelling and ontologies
• Impact of metamodelling on standards development
• Use of metamodelling in agent-oriented software engineering
• Use of metamodelling in object-oriented software engineering
• Metamodels as underpinnings for modelling languages
• The role of metamodels in MDA and model transformations
• Metamodelling in relation to tool building
• Metamodel support for process measurement and improvement
• Business reasons for adopting a metamodel

Papers should be submitted via the conference website (http://www.icsoft.org/) by 15 April 2007. Instructions on format and length are to be found on the conference website; templates can be found at http://www.icsoft.org/Paper_Templates.htm). Papers should be original research contributions and will be reviewed by at least two members of the programme committee and published with ISBN (again, see the conference website for details).

The workshop itself will be scheduled as part of the ICSOFT 2007 conference in Barcelona, Spain (22-25 July 2007): http://www.icsoft.org/

Important dates

Paper submission: 15 April

Author Notification: 15 May

Camera Ready Submission and Registration: 1 June

Workshop: one day within conference dates of 22-25 July

Workshop Co-Chairs

Dr Cesar Gonzalez-Perez, Spain

Professor Brian Henderson-Sellers, Australia

The "Identity Commons" organization has recently chartered a working group to work on "schemas" for digital identity information (name, address, phone number, that kind of information). Participation is open to all constructive parties.

Its first goal is to create a place on the web where a collection of "pointers" can be assembled that point to definitions that have already been created by various initiatives for identity information, and to identify synonyms.

More information is at the http://wiki.idcommons.net/moin.cgi/IdentitySchemasCharter charter, and its http://identityschemas.org/ wiki.