Jennifer Pérez

PRISMA: towards quality, aspect oriented and dynamic software architectures

The development of software systems must be done using platforms that allow the description of quality, complex, distributed, dynamic and reusable architectural models. We present in this paper PRISMA, an architectural modelling approach based on aspects and components that uses a component definition language (components, connectors and systems) to define architectural types at a high abstraction level and a configuration language to design the architecture of software systems. The component definition language increases reuse allowing importation of COTS and reduces complexity by integrating two modern software development approaches: component-based software development and aspect-oriented software development. The configuration language designs the architecture of software systems by creating and interconnecting instances of the defined types including possible imported COTS. PRISMA has a metalevel with reflexive properties for these two languages. For this reason, the types of PRISMA may evolve and the topologies of PRISMA may be reconfigured dynamically.

Designing software architectures with an aspect-oriented architecture description language

A great deal of languages have emerged and have demonstrated the advantages that Aspect-Oriented Programming offers. For this reason, the aspect-oriented approach is being introduced into the early phases (analysis and design) of the software life cycle. In this work, we present an Aspect-Oriented Architecture Description Language (AOADL) to specify software architectures of complex, dynamic and distributed software systems. This AOADL follows the PRISMA approach, which integrates the advantages of Component-Based Software Development (CBSD) and Aspect-Oriented Software Development (AOSD). The PRISMA AOADL combines components and aspects in an elegant and novel way achieving a better management of crosscutting-concerns. In addition, it is independent of the technology, and it has great expressive power in order to facilitate the automatic code generation from its specifications. In this work, we demonstrate how PRISMA AOADL improves the management, maintainability and reusability of software architectures introducing the notion of aspect in its ADL.

Dynamic evolution in aspect-oriented architectural models

This paper presents a solution to the evolution problem of software architectures. This solution is provided by PRISMA. PRISMA is an architecture modeling approach that integrates the advantages of Component-Based Software Development (CBSD) and Aspect-Oriented Software Development (AOSD). This integration is reflected in its model and in its Architecture Description Language (ADL). In this paper, PRISMA is presented as a framework to evolve aspect-oriented and component-based architectures by requirements-driven evolution. The evolution is supported by means of a meta-level and the reflexive properties of PRISMA ADL which have been implemented as a middleware. In addition, it is demonstrated how the evolution services of the PRISMA meta-level permit the run-time evolution of software architectures using an industrial case study, the TeachMover Robot.

Mobile Ambients in Aspect-Oriented Software Architectures

Nowadays, distributed and mobile systems are acquiring importance and becoming widely extended for supporting ubiquitous computing. In order to develop such systems in a technology-independent way, it is important to have a formalism that describes distribution and mobility at a high abstraction level. Ambient Calculus is a formalism that allows the representation of boundaries where computation occurs. Also, distributed and mobile systems are usually difficult to develop as they need to take into account functional and non-functional requirements and reusability and adaptability mechanisms. In order to achieve these needs it is necessary to separate the distribution and mobility concerns from the rest of the concerns. PRISMA is an approach that integrates the advantages of Component-Based Software Development and Aspect-Oriented Software Development for specifying software architectures. In this paper, we describe how our work combines Ambient Calculus with PRISMA to develop distributed and mobile systems gaining their advantages.

Coordination in Software Architectures: an Aspect-Oriented Approach

Currently, software architecture is presented as a solution for the design and development of complex and large software systems. One of the main advantages of the use of software architectures is reuse [1]. Software architectures allow us to reuse software at different levels of abstraction (simple components, architectural styles, etc.) for different purposes (general and domainspecific). Reuse improves the time and cost invested in the development and maintenance processes of software.

Introducing Ambient Calculus in Mobile Aspect-Oriented Software

Currently most software systems have a distributed nature. The development of distributed and mobile software is a complex task. As a result, it is important to take into account distribution and mobility from the early stages of the development process instead of delaying their considerations to the implementation stage. In this work, we present how to consider distribution and mobility features at the architectural level.