The paper is about implementation of Model-driven engineering (MDE) and Product line engineering (PLE) for future software development and also to increase automation of application development. End user development (EUD) is an emerging paradigm where end users create and adapt systems themselves. Implementation ofMDE and PLE for EUD in small domains is done by using a simple software production line that allows domain engineers to easily set up product line member instantiation environments for end users.
MDE it uses models as the primary engineering artifacts and provides different aspects of a system where as PLE focuses on application domains, rather than individual systems, and allows individual systems to be built automatically. Product line engineering which is opposed to single system engineering methods addresses multi-system scope development. PLE uses domain engineering for development of generic systems from concrete systems or components can be reused in different systems can be instantiated.
This type of building concrete systems based on results of domain engineering is referred to as application engineering. The two roles involved in end user development are domain engineer and end user. End user is the one who is advanced computer user with domain knowledge but are neither skilled nor interested in software engineering. The role of the application engineer is made dispensable. Since end users build their systems themselves which is main goal of EUD.
Present software product line tools are suitable for large domains and are focussed at skilled developers Whereas SimPL is intended for small domains and specifically targets end user development: End users instantiate product line members using a graphical domain specific modelling language that is provided by the domain engineer who employed SimPL to set up the product line member instantiation environment. Domain engineers only need to write the product line specification to set up the instantiation environment, such that end users can use the graphical editor and the code generator that are part of SimPL.