Trace-Directed Modelling Status Report

1. Trace-Directed ModellingStatus Report Sultan Eid and Hamoud Aljamaan CRuiSE (Complexity Reduction in Software Engineering) Research Group SITE (School of Information Technology and Engineering) University of Ottawa June 29, 200 http://www.site.uottawa.ca/~tcl

2. An initial note: • Tim Lethbridge apologizes for not being present • He had booked his vacation prior to this meeting being planned

3. Main Activities Since December • New members have joined (discussed later) • Productive discussions with Ericsson, with Bran Selic and among ourselves regarding our research agenda • Developing a vision that will have to be refined • Learning and exploring infrastructure • Papyrus and other modeling tools • C++ code generators • Systematic reviews • Reverse engineering

4. Current Vision 1: Modeling Tool for the Trace-Directed Modeling Subproject • Model to be traced should be in an open source modelling tool • In UML using the MARTE (real time) profile • Represented as • Class diagrams • State diagrams • Composite structure diagrams • We would develop a language/profile to specify tracing • Will have a metamodel • Adding tracepoints to the model • Would need a visual representation so tracepoints could be seen on the model • The generated code would • Be in C++ (possibly other also) • Generate needed calls to the LTTng API

5. Current Vision 2: Key Ideas for the Trace Specification Metamodel • The tracepoints could be attached to such elements as: • Conditions becoming true, expressed in terms of model elements • Setting/query of an association, attribute • Following a transition • Sending or receipt of a message/event • Entry/exit of a state • For each of the above you should be able to trace on • Subset of objects of a class in specific threads/ processes/ devices/ states • Ability to name tracing scenarios so one (or some combination) can be activated as needed • Ability to automatically activate a trace scenario when something ‘interesting’ happens • Ability to specify, in model terms, the data to be gathered during tracing

6. Current Vision 3: Reflecting And Manipulating a Trace In the Model • Resulting traces would be interpreted by the modeling tool in the context of the original model • Possibilities: The engineer could … • Look at the model including the tracepoint specification and see • Coloured/highlighted places where tracing occurred, with the intensity shown • Animation of state diagrams • Generated sequence diagrams or state machine • Other ? • Jump among all these views • See other diagnostics related to trace results • Adjust tracepoints dynamically in the running system to gather more/less/different data

7. Infrastructure Needed for the Project • Open source modeling tool with sufficient capabilities and which will likely be stable • This is currently a challenge since this technology is in a state of flux • Papyrus is not ‘finished’ • Adding substantially to it will lead to lots of rework • An upcoming new Eclipse Foundation modeling platform may be the best option • But will be another couple of years • The best solution will be to keep our design and implementation generic • Pluggable to any modelling tool • With a small ‘interface’ layer

8. The Need For Scientific Grounding of the Real Problem • We need to observe real software engineers doing tracing in a model-driven context • Why? • So we have the right use cases • So we can demonstrate that our results provide a contribution in terms of productivity

9. Other Challenges • Commercial tools already implement a considerable portion of what we want • IBM RSA, Rhapsody and even Rose/RT provide the ability to inject code for debugging and tracing, and to see and explore the results • They overload the terms extensibility and traceability • Conclusion • We will need to limit ourselves to manageable and focused parts of our vision to ensure we are making scientific process, not ‘reinventing the wheel’ • This refinement will require ongoing study

10. What team members are doing 1 • Hamoud Aljamaan • Phd Student • Comprehensive review of model-directed tracing • Working at the abstract level • Building theory • Language design • Modeling the needed software • Sultan Eid • Masters student (hoping to later become PhD student) • Analysing the main technical challenges

11. What team members are doing 2 • Ahmed and Mahmoud Orabi • Part time PhD students at IBM • Conducting a comprehensive review of state machine reverse engineering • Prototyping a novel approach to reverse engineering state machines using static analysis • Studying ‘conceptual refactoring’ • Julie Filion • Summer undergraduate student working partly on this project • Helping us build infrastructure • Omar Badreldin • PhD student working on state machines in a separate project • Experimented with injecting trace commands into generated code • Others • Other students working on the Umple project are contributing to discussions

12. Case Studies We Will Work On • Debrief • We received a model in Enterprise Architect • Proved difficult to work with since the model was descriptive and in a tool that • An objective will be to convert this to a model that captures the entire system allowing model-driven development • Regeneration of the system with trace code injected • LTTng itself • We will obtain the source code, and build a model that can generate part of LTTng • Others, to be determined • For both tools: We have developed a technique called umplification • Allows injection of model information directly in the source code • We will see if ths works in the context of these two case studies

13. Systematic Review Progress • Objective • Survey existing state of the art work in the area of model based tracing, particularly, for class and state machine UML models. • Systematic means • Disciplined search for all relevant literature • Asking a pre-defined set of research question for about each paper found • The research questions for our systematic review • What is the state of the art in model based tracing? • What types of modeling notation is used to achieve model based tracing? • What are the tools (commercial, research prototypes) available for model based tracing? • What are the techniques and approaches to implementation of model based tracing?