Keynote: Performance Analysis of Domain Specific Visual Models

Prof. Antonio Vallecillo

Domain specific visual languages (DSVLs) play a key role in Model-Driven Engineering. They allow domain experts to develop and to manipulate models of their systems using intuitive and graphical notations, much closer to their domain languages and at the right level of abstraction. DSVLs are normally equipped with supporting toolkits including editors, validators and code generation facilities. Many DSVLs also allow the specification of the behavioral dynamics of systems, beyond their basic structure. However, there is still the need to model, simulate and analyze other critical aspects of systems, such as their non-functional properties. In particular QoS usage and management constraints (performance, reliability, etc.) are essential characteristics of any non-trivial system that cannot be neglected. Current proposals for the specification of such kind of properties tend to require skilled knowledge of specialized languages and notations such as MARTE. This clashes with the intuitive nature of end-user DSVLs and hinders its smooth combination with them.

In this talk we present an approach to specify QoS properties in DSVLs, and show how it enables different kinds of analysis of the performance and reliability of the systems being specified. We also discuss the strategic role that model transformations play in this context, the opportunities they provide, and their current challenges for bridging the different semantic and technological domains involved in the specification and analysis of systems.