Christian Pichler
ABSTRACT
Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) is based on the standardization of business document types. Usually, a standard business document type is defined in an all-embracing manner covering all elements needed in any business context, such as geopolitical context, industry context, and others. Before exchanging business documents in a particular business context, business partners have to agree on an implementation guide resulting in a subset of the standard document type. Different subsets of a standard document type may also be considered as variants of the standard document type. Since no agreed methodology for building variants of standard documents types exists, the domain of EDI may learn from Software Engineering. In fact, we are facing the need for managing variants which is typically addressed in Software Configuration Management. In this position paper, we propose utilizing concepts from Product Line Engineering (PLE) for managing variability in business document models. Therefore, we present the challenges encountered in managing variability in business documents. Furthermore, we provide a profound discussion why concepts from PLE are promising for managing business document variants.
- L. Bendix, J. Graden, and A. Stahl. A configuration management perspective on composing software product lines. Technical report, Lund University, Sweden, 2009.Google Scholar
- P. Clements and L. Northrop. Software Product Lines: Practices and Patterns. Addison-Wesley, 2007.Google Scholar
- R. Conradi and B. Westfechtel. Version Models for Software Configuration Management. ACM Computing Surveys, 30(2), 1998. Google ScholarDigital Library
- K. Czarnecki and M. Antkiewicz. Mapping Features to Models: A Template Approach Based on Superimposed Variants. In 4th Int. Conf. on Generative Programming and Component Engineering, 2005. Google ScholarDigital Library
- K. Czarnecki, M. Antkiewicz, C. H. P. Kim, S. Lau, and K. Pietroszek. Model-driven Software Product Lines. In 20th Annual ACM SIGPLAN Conf. on Object-Oriented Programming, Systems, Languages, and Applications, 2005. Google ScholarDigital Library
- K. Czarnecki, S. Helsen, and U. W. Eisenecker. Formalizing Cardinality-based Feature Models and their Specialization. Software Process: Improvement and Practice, 10(1), 2005.Google Scholar
- M. Dalagarno and D. Beuche. Variant Management. In 3rd British Computer Scociety Configuration Management Specialist Group Conf., 2007.Google Scholar
- Danilo Beuche. What's the difference? A Closer Look at Configuration Management for Product Lines.Google Scholar
- EC Export Group. Final Report on e-Invoicing.Google Scholar
- I. Groher and M. Voelter. Expressing Feature-Based Variability in Structural Models. In Workshop on Managing Variability for Softw. Product Lines, 2007.Google Scholar
- K. Holman. UBL Catalogue analysis.Google Scholar
- C. W. Krueger. Variation Management for Software Production Lines. In Second Int. Software Product Line Conf., 2002. Google ScholarDigital Library
- R. Laqua and P. Knauber. Configuration Management for Software Product Lines. In 1. Deutscher Software-Produktlinien-Workshop, 2000.Google Scholar
- N. López, R. Casallas, and A. van der Hoek. Issues in mapping change-based product line architecturesto configuration management systems. In 13th Int. Conf. on Software Product Lines, 2009. Google ScholarDigital Library
- B. Meyers, M. Wimmer, A. Cicchetti, and J. Sprinkle. A generic in-place transformation-based approach to structured model co-evolution. In 4th Int. Workshop on Multi-Paradigm Modeling, 2010.Google Scholar
- Mike Doran. JASTPRO Seminar.Google Scholar
- R. Mitschke and M. Eichberg. Supporting the evolution of software product lines. In ECMDA Traceability Workshop, 2008.Google Scholar
- B. Morin, F. Fleurey, N. Bencomo, J.-M. Jézéquel, A. Solberg, V. Dehlen, and G. S. Blair. An Aspect-Oriented and Model-Driven Approach for Managing Dynamic Variability. In 11th Int. Conf. on Model Driven Eng. Languages ans Systems, 2008. Google ScholarDigital Library
- C. Pichler, M. Seidl, and C. Huemer. Managing Variability and Evolution of Business Document Models. In 2nd Int. Workshop on Model-driven Product Line Engineering, 2010.Google Scholar
- W. Schäfer. Product-line development requires sophisticated software configuration management. In 10th Int. Software Process Workshop, 1996. Google ScholarDigital Library
- C. Thao, E. V. Munson, and T. N. Nguyen. Software Configuration Management for Product Derivation in Software Product Families. In 15th Annual IEEE Int. Conf. and Workshop on Engineering of Computer Based Systems, 2008. Google ScholarDigital Library
- W. F. Tichy. Tools for Software Configuration Management. In Int. Workshop on Software Version and Configuration Control, 1988.Google Scholar
- UN/CEFACT. Core Components Technical Specification 3.0.Google Scholar
- J. van Gurp and C. Prehofer. Version management tools as a basis for integrating Product Derivation and Software Product Families. In Workshop on Variability Management, 2006.Google Scholar
- L. Yu and S. Ramaswamy. A Configuration Management Model for Software Product Line. INFOCOMP Journal of Computer Science, 5(4), 2006.Google Scholar
Index Terms
- Towards variability management in business document types using product line engineering
Recommendations
Validation of business document types based on feature models
VaMoS '12: Proceedings of the 6th International Workshop on Variability Modeling of Software-Intensive SystemsThe United Nations Centre for Trade Facilitation and eBusiness (UN/CEFACT) provides the Core Components approach for defining standard business document types based on all-embracing, reusable building blocks. For utilizing standard business document ...
Feature modeling for business document models
SPLC '11: Proceedings of the 15th International Software Product Line Conference, Volume 2The United Nations Centre for Trace Facilitation and eBusiness (UN/CEFACT) provides a conceptual approach named Core Components for defining business document types based on generic, reusable building blocks. For facilitating interoperability in ...
Using Documentation for Product Line Scoping
Product line scoping is the process of determining which of an organization's products, features, and domains would find systematic reuse economically useful. Scoping is generally the first phase in product line engineering. For a decade, it has been ...
Comments