Mikyeong Moon

An approach to developing domain requirements as a core asset based on commonality and variability analysis in a product line

The methodologies of product line engineering emphasize proactive reuse to construct high-quality products more quickly that are less costly. Requirements engineering for software product families differs significantly from requirements engineering for single software products. The requirements for a product line are written for the group of systems as a whole, with requirements for individual systems specified by a delta or an increment to the generic set. Therefore, it is necessary to identify and explicitly denote the regions of commonality and points of variation at the requirements level. In this paper, we suggest a method of producing requirements that will be a core asset in the product line. We describe a process for developing domain requirements where commonality and variability in a domain are explicitly considered. A CASE environment, named DREAM, for managing commonality and variability analysis of domain requirements is also described. We also describe a case study for an e-travel system domain where we found that our approach to developing domain requirements based on commonality and variability analysis helped to produce domain requirements as a core asset for product lines.

CASS: A Context-Aware Simulation System for Smart Home

Ubiquitous computing (ubicomp) environments provide access to information and computing resources for users at any time and anywhere. In the approaching ubiquitous ear, many self-adaptive applications are emerging. These can be made to adapt to the environment within which the application operates. Context information is the key to producing self-adaptive applications in ubicomp environments. However, the supporting infrastructure that generates context information can be made dynamically responsive to the environment. Therefore, for the development of self-adaptive applications, it is necessary to demonstrate that valid context information can be created by virtual sensors instead of physical sensors. In this paper we present a context aware simulation system called CASS. In particular, it generates the context information associated with virtual sensors and virtual devices in a smart home domain. By using CASS, the self-adaptive application developer can immediately detect rule conflict in context information and determine optimal sensors and devices in a smart home.

Contextual Events Framework in RFID System

Radio frequency identification (RFID) technology is considered to be the next step in the revolution of supply-chain management, retail, and beyond. To derive real benefit from RFID, the applications must incorporate functions to process the enormous event data generated quickly by RFID operations. For this reason, many RFID middleware systems have been developed. Although RFID middleware assists in the management of the flow of event data, developers require real time knowledge of meaningful events, which are more actionable not simple data collection. Determining meaningful events requires a context, which typically comes from reference data. In this paper, we present a contextual event framework (CEF) that transforms RFID events into contextual events

RFID Business Aware Framework for Business Process in the EPC Network

Radio frequency identification (RFID) technology has been applied to many business areas to simplify complex processes and gain important benefits. To derive real benefit from RFID, the system must rapidly implement functions to process the large quantity of event data generated by RFID operations and should be configured dynamically for changing businesses. Consequently, developers are forced to implement systems to derive meaningful high-level events from simple RFID events and bind them to various business processes. Although applications could directly consume and act on RFID events, extracting the business rules from the business logic leads to better decoupling of the system, which consequentially increases maintainability. In this paper, we describe an RFID business aware framework for business process in the electronic product code (EPC) network. The solutions and techniques presented in this paper are based on our experience of RFID middleware from the logistics information technology project.

Two-Level Variability Analysis for Business Process with Reusability and Extensibility

Many of todays businesses have changed from rigid siloed application approaches to more flexible business process focused solutions. Business processes are dynamic entities. At any given time, they must handle a variety of business situations that are changing over time. The business process model must be able to follow these changes, so it is necessary to support the systematic development of a set of similar business processes by understanding and controlling their common and distinguishing characteristics. Management of differences, which is called variability management, is considered the key in product-line development processes. That is, the methods of product-line engineering can be used to make the processes more responsive to changes in the business. This paper describes an approach for analyzing the variability of the business process. In developing the model for business process, variations are analyzed at different abstract levels in which the region of commonality is identified and the variations are refined. The model for business processes, explicitly representing commonality and variability, is described using UML activity diagrams.

A metamodel approach to architecture variability in a product line

Architecture describes the organizational structure of a system including components, interactions, and constraints. Reusable components, units of software systems, have been considered to support a considerable improvement in reducing development costs and time to market because their interfaces and functionality are explicitly defined. Instead of reusing an individual component, however, it is much more advantageous to reuse a whole design or architecture. A domain architecture, sharing a common software architecture across a product line, includes common components shared by all products and optional components exploited by a subset of the products. Variability, one of the key concepts in the development of domain architectures indicates the ability to derive various products from the product line. Clearly, we need to support variability during domain architecture development. In this paper, we suggest a metamodeling concept that enables a common under-standing of architecture variability. The domain architecture metamodel reflects the Object Management Groups (OMGTM) Reusable Asset Specification (RAS) which addresses the engineering elements of reuse. We describe a domain architecture in which commonality and variability are explicitly considered.

A Metamodeling Approach to Tracing Variability between Requirements and Architecture in Software Product Lines

Even in traditional single software product development, failure to manage changes in requirements can cause degeneration of the architecture and components. Traceability issues are even more important in the product line because the impact of changes in a product line can involve all the product line-based applications. Variability means the ability of a software system to be changed, customized or configured for use in a particular context and it should be managed at different levels of abstraction. In this paper, we suggest a metamodeling approach to support the tracing of the variability in requirements and architecture. Two metamodels representing the domain requirements and domain architecture with variability are proposed. Based on the proposed metamodels, we describe trace relationships between requirements and architecture with respect to variability.

A framework for rapid development of RFID applications

Radio Frequency IDentification (RFID) technology is considered to be the next step in the revolution in supply-chain management, retail, and beyond. To derive real benefit from RFID, a RFID application must implement functions to process the enormous event data generated quickly by RFID operations. For this reason, many RFID middleware systems have been developed. Although RFID middleware assists in the management of the flow of event data, developers will be forced to implement systems to derive from simple RFID events meaningful high-level events, which are more actionable knowledge that can be applied. Determining meaningful events requires a context, which typically comes from reference data. In this paper, we propose the contextual event framework (CEF) for rapid development of RFID applications. The solutions and techniques presented in this paper are based on our experience of RFID middleware of the Logistics Information Technology (LIT) project.

An approach to developing reusable domain services for service oriented applications

Today, the software environment paradigm is shifting to service-oriented computing, based on key features that reflect business concerns. The SOMA and SOUP methodologies can be used to develop service-oriented applications. However, these approaches focus on developing monolithic service applications. Therefore, we propose a feature-based reusable domain service development approach to create more reusable and flexible domain services offering commonality and variability.

An Approach to Designing Service-Oriented Product-Line Architecture for Business Process Families

Since the requirements of enterprises are complex and changeable, it is necessary to have solutions that are proactive and flexible. In a service-oriented architecture (SOA), because services are independent, loosely coupled, and reusable, they can be integrated flexibly. Business processes are generally built by integrating services. However, an enterprise must tackle the serious issues of the cost and time required for changing processes. Therefore, we apply a product-line technique to SOA. This allows us to generate various integrated services. The integrated services represent work processes of enterprises and they can be designed immediately as new requirements. Service-oriented product-line architecture (SOPLA) supports the design and management of business process families. This paper demonstrates the method of designing SOPLA and the manner in which SOPLA can be used to produce business process families.