City Research Online

Abstract

This paper proposes an object-based framework for the development of heterogeneous, composite systems. Such systems require the use of multiple notations and development strategies to describe multiple developer perspectives. The framework employs coarse-grain objects, called ViewPoints, that represent “agents” having “rolesin” and “views-of” a problem domain. These ViewPoints are loosely coupled, locally managed encapsulations, integrated via inter-ViewPoint consistency relations and transformations. Tool integration is treated as a special case of method integration, and is demonstrated by The viewer - a prototype support environment presented in this paper. The viewer supports the proposed framework, and illustrates how ViewPoints may be used for method design, description, integration and use. Developed in Objectworks/Smalltalk, it maps the object-based framework onto an object-oriented implementation. The top level architecture and implementation of The viewer is also briefly presented.

Publication Type:	Book Section
Additional Information:	© 1992 IEEE. Personal use of this material is permitted. Permission from IEEE must be obtained for all other users, including reprinting/ republishing this material for advertising or promotional purposes, creating new collective works for resale or redistribution to servers or lists, or reuse of any copyrighted components of this work in other works.
Subjects:	Q Science > QA Mathematics > QA75 Electronic computers. Computer science
Departments:	Presidents's Portfolio

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