Name
Title | ||
|---|---|---|
Lessons learned from developing mbeddr: a case study in language engineering with MPS. |
Abstract | ||
|---|---|---|
Language workbenches are touted as a promising technology to engineer languages for use in a wide range of domains, from programming to science to business. However, not many real-world case studies exist that evaluate the suitability of language workbench technology for this task. This paper contains such a case study. In particular, we evaluate the development of mbeddr, a collection of integrated languages and language extensions built with the Jetbrains MPS language workbench. mbeddr consists of 81 languages, with their IDE support, 34 of them C extensions. The mbeddr languages use a wide variety of notations—textual, tabular, symbolic and graphical—and the C extensions are modular; new extensions can be added without changing the existing implementation of C. mbeddr’s development has spanned 10 person-years so far, and the tool is used in practice and continues to be developed. This makes mbeddr a meaningful case study of non-trivial size and complexity. The evaluation is centered around five research questions: language modularity, notational freedom and projectional editing, mechanisms for managing complexity, performance and scalability issues and the consequences for the development process. We draw generally positive conclusions; language engineering with MPS is ready for real-world use. However, we also identify a number of areas for improvement in the state of the art in language engineering in general, and in MPS in particular. |
Year | DOI | Venue |
|---|---|---|
2019 | 10.1007/s10270-016-0575-4 | Software and System Modeling |
Keywords | Field | DocType |
Language engineering, Language extension, Language workbenches, Domain-specific language, Case study, Languages, Experimentation | Domain-specific language,Second-generation programming language,Programming language,Software engineering,Computer science,Fourth-generation programming language,Very high-level programming language,High-level programming language,Third-generation programming language,Low-level programming language,Language technology | Journal |
Volume | Issue | ISSN |
18 | 1 | 1619-1374 |
Citations | PageRank | References |
2 | 0.39 | 67 |
Authors | ||
5 | ||
Name | Order | Citations | PageRank |
|---|---|---|---|
| Markus Voelter | 1 | 321 | 29.85 |
| Bernd Kolb | 2 | 151 | 13.29 |
| Tamás Szabó | 3 | 7 | 2.28 |
| Daniel Ratiu | 4 | 493 | 38.87 |
| A. van Deursen | 5 | 4034 | 254.98 |