Facilitating Automation of Architecture Description Meta-models






requirements, ADL theory, software Architecture Ontology


A common understanding of structural abstractions 
and their underlying design assumptions in architecture 
descriptions (AD), is as important for development 
of complex systems, as agreeing on electrical 
power standards and shapes of electrical sockets 
is, to the production of domestic appliances. 
Explicating design assumptions encourages their formal modeling 
and automation. We strongly believe that achieving 
their proper formalism/automation requires recognition of AD 
meta-model ontologies as first class objects in 
software architectures. Accepting this premise imposes new 
requirements on ADLs. We want to restrict 
ADLs to act only as supporting infrastructure 
by being (1) "neutral" enough to define 
structural aspects of AD independent of specific 
commitments to their conceptualization, and (2) "extensible" 
enough to use these constructs in supporting 
formalisms at meta-level. In this paper, we 
present requirements and a linguistic framework for 
ADLs that supports formalism of AD meta-model 
ontologies.