A Visual Meta-Language for Generic Modeling

This research examines the usefulness of a visual meta-language (VLGM - Visual Language for Generic Modeling) developed for the specification of components and relations in a modeling domain. The language is designed to allow software tools to interpret specifications and automatically provide modeling environments. VLGM makes use of the object-orientated software engineering methodology. It defines four types of special classes and three types of relations between them. Data types and primitive types are allocated with several attributes to provide restrictions and enable consistency checks over models. As part of this research a software tool was designed. The tool provides a workspace for creating VLGM specifications. It interprets VLGM designs and provides a generic modeling environment. An XML document format is used as a persistence mechanism to promote reusability and sharing. Four case studies from different modeling domains are used to explore the applicability of the idea.