12th European Conference on Object-Oriented Programming Brussels, Belgium, July 20 - 24, 1998
	Tutorial T2

Modelling Component Architectures

In Component Based Development, software products are assembled rapidly from robust (and more carefully designed) components that can be coupled in many configurations. Ideally, the components are designed as a coherent kit (like logic chips or Lego), from which many products can be made with minimum glue. Larger components generally come from different sources and need wrapping to join a kit.

Each component in a kit can plug into a wide variety of others. This is possible only if they have a common set of rules and protocols for their interconnections; and common models and representations of the domain concepts. These important definitions, the component kit architecture, must be made at an early stage.

This tutorial will show how to use modeling techniques to define a kit architecture in detail, how to check the conformance of components to it, and how to reconcile the different models of bought-in components.

You can already download the PDF presentation.

Alan Cameron Wills has been a consultant and lecturer in object technology since 1990, working with clients in many fields including telecoms and finance. He is joint developer of Catalysis, a UML-based rigorous approach for component-based development.