A Rewriting Logic Semantics for ATL

By: Javier Troya, Antonio Vallecillo

Abstract

As the complexity of model transformation (MT) grows, the need to rely on formal semantics of MT languages becomes a critical issue. Formal semantics provide precise specifications of the expected behavior of transformations, allowing users to understand them and to use them properly, and MT tool builders to develop correct MT engines, compilers, etc. In addition, formal semantics allow modelers to reason about the MTs and to prove their correctness, something specially important in case of large and complex MTs (with, e.g., hundreds or thousands of rules) for which manual debugging is no longer possible. In this paper we give a formal semantics of the ATL 3.0 model transformation language using rewriting logic and Maude, which allows addressing these issues. Such formalization provides additional benefits, such as enabling the simulation of the specifications or giving access to the Maude toolkit to reason about them.

Keywords

ATL, Maude, Model Transformation, semantics

Cite as:

Javier Troya, Antonio Vallecillo, “A Rewriting Logic Semantics for ATL”, Journal of Object Technology, Volume 10, (2011), pp. 5:1-29, doi:10.5381/jot.2011.10.1.a5.

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The JOT Journal   |   ISSN 1660-1769   |   DOI 10.5381/jot   |   AITO   |   Open Access   |    Contact