Collaborative software engineering (CoSE) deals with methods, processes and tools for enhancing collaboration, communication, and co-ordination (3C) among team members. CoSE can be employed to conceive different kinds of artifacts during the development and evolution of software systems. For instance, when focusing on software design, multiple stakeholders with different expertise and responsibility collaborate on the system design. Model-Driven Software Engineering (MDSE) provides suitable techniques and tools for specifying, manipulating, and analyzing modeling artifacts including metamodels, models, and transformations. A collaborative MDSE approach can be defined as a method or technique allowing multiple stakeholders to work on a set of shared modeling artifacts, and to be aware of each others’ work. Even though Collaborative MDSE is gaining a growing interest in both academia and practice, a holistic view on what Collaborative MDSE is, its components, the related opportunities and challenges is still missing. In this talk, I outlined the main insights of the systematic mapping study we have done to identify and classify approaches, methods, and techniques that support collaborative. We present three complementary dimensions that we have identified during the study as the peculiar aspects building up a collaborative MDSE: a model management infrastructure for managing the life cycle of the models, a set of collaboration means for allowing involved stakeholders to work on the modelling artifacts collaboratively, and a set of communication means for allowing involved stakeholders to be aware of the activities of the other stakeholders. The identification of limitations and challenges of currently available collaborative MDE approaches is also given by discussing the implications for future investigation.

1. Dipartimento di Ingegneria e Scienze
Università degli Studi dell’Aquila
dell’Informazione e Matematica
Collaborative
Model-Driven Software Engineering:
a Systematic Mapping Study
Davide Di Ruscio
davide.diruscio@univaq.it
COMMitMDE at MoDELS 2016 – Saint-Malo, October 4, 2016

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Joint work with
Prof. Henry Muccini
University of L’Aquila
Dr. Ivano Malavolta
Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam
Mirco Franzago
University of L’Aquila

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Collaborative Software Engineering
“Collaborative software engineering (CoSE) deals
with methods, processes and tools for enhancing
collaboration, communication, and co-ordination
(3C) among team members” (*)
(*) Ivan Mistrik, John Grundy, Andr Hoek, and Jim Whitehead (Eds.). 2010.
Collaborative Software Engineering. Springer Berlin Heidelberg.

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Collaborative Software Engineering
When focusing on software design multiple
stakeholders with different background collaborate
on the development of the system
CoSE is not only about software development team
members
It can embrace also external and non-technical
stakeholders
• e.g., customers, final users

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Collaborative Software Engineering
Collaborative
Model Driven Software Engineering
?

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Collaboration in MDSE
Versioning

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different aspects & concepts

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Collaborative
Model-Driven Software Engineering (CoMDSE)
A large body of knowledge about different aspects
of collaborative model-driven software engineering
(MDSE) exists
A study analysing, classifying, and comparing
approaches and methods for MDSE is still missing

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Systematic Mapping Studies
“… Systematic mapping studies or scoping studies
are designed to give an overview of a research area
through classification and counting contributions
in relation to the categories of that classification… ”
“…It involves searching the literature in order to know
what topics have been covered in the literature, and
where the literature has been published …”
Kai Petersen, et al., Guidelines for conducting systematic mapping studies in
software engineering: An update, Information and Software Technology, Volume
64, Pages 1-18, 2015

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Systematic Mapping Study of CoMDSE
Main goals:
1. Draw a complete, comprehensive and valid
picture of the state of the art about collaborative
MDSE
2. Identify potential gaps in current research and
future research directions

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Defining CoMDSE…
1. Analysis of a set of studies about MDSE approaches with
a strong focus on collaboration;
2. Investigation on existing literature about collaborative
approaches for software engineering in general;
3. Produced a tentative definition of CoMDSE;
4. MDSE and global software engineering experts have
been involved to objectively assess the soundness of the
obtained definition;
5. the definition was refined according to the feedback
provided by the experts.

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Defining CoMDSE
A collaborative MDSE approach is defined as a
method or technique in which multiple stakeholders
manage, collaborate, and are aware of each others’
work on a set of shared models.

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Collaborative MDSE dimensions
A model management infrastructure for managing the life cycle of
the models
A set of collaboration means for allowing involved stakeholders to
work on the modelling artifacts collaboratively
A set of communication means for allowing involved stakeholders
to be aware of the activities of the other stakeholders.

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Overview of the review process
http://tinyurl.com/glv7bg5

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Overview of the review process
http://tinyurl.com/glv7bg5

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Overview of the review process
http://tinyurl.com/glv7bg5
1.Establish the need for performing the
mapping study on collaborative MDSE
2.Identifying the main research
questions
3.Defining the protocol to be followed

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Overview of the review process
http://tinyurl.com/glv7bg5
1. Search and selection
(definition of the search string, backward and forward
snowblaling, …)
2. Comparison framework definition
(data extraction form)
3. Data extraction
(fill in the data extraction for each primary study)
4. Data synthesis
(comprehensive summary)

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Overview of the review process
http://tinyurl.com/glv7bg5
1. Elaboration of the extracted data
2. Analysis of the possible threats to validity
3. Writing of reports

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Research questions
They are crucial ingredients for performing
systematic mapping studies
.
Purpose Identify, classify, and understand
Issue the publication trends, characteristics, and challenges
Object of existing collaborative MDSE approaches
Viewpoint from a researcher’s viewpoint
Goal-Question-Metric perspectives

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Research questions
RQ1: What are the characteristics of collaborative
MDSE approaches ?
Objective: to identify and classify existing CoMDSE
approaches according to the three dimensions (model
management, collaboration, communication)
Outcome: a map that classifies a set of CoMDSE based on
different categories

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Research questions
RQ2: What are the challenges of existing CoMDSE
approaches ?
Objective: to identify current limitations and challenges with
respect to the state of the art in CoMDSE
Outcome: a map that classifies CoMDSE with respect to their
limitations, faced challenges, and future work

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Research questions
RQ3: What are the publication trends about
collaborative MDSE approaches over time ?
Objective: to identify and classify the interest of researchers in
CoMDSE approaches and their various characteristic over
time
Output: a map that classifies the collected primary studies
according to publication year, venue, etc.

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Some numbers….
• 6 scientific search engines
• 3047 papers after automatic search
• 160 papers after title+abstract selection
• 108 papers after full-text selection
• 48 main studies after clusterization
• 84 attributes for data extraction/analysis

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Inclusion Criteria
I1. Studies proposing an MDSE method or technique
for supporting the collaborative work of multiple
stakeholders on models
I2. Studies in which models are the primary artifacts
within the collaboration process
I3. Studies providing some kind of validation or
evaluation of the proposed method or technique
• e.g., via a case study, a survey, experiment, exploitation in industry,
formal analysis, example usage
I4. Studies subject to peer review (e.g., journal
papers, papers published as part of conference)

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Exclusion Criteria
E1. Studies discussing only business processes
and collaboration practices, without proposing
a specific method or technique
E2. Secondary studies
(e.g., systematic literature reviews, surveys, etc.)
E3. Studies that do not provide enough information
(e.g., in the form of tutorial papers, long abstract papers, poster
papers, editorials)

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Publication trends

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Taxonomy: Collaboration
Allowing involved stakeholders to
work on the modelling artifacts
collaboratively

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Taxonomy: Collaboration

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Taxonomy: Communication
Allowing involved stakeholders to be aware
of the activities of the other stakeholders

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Taxonomy: Communication
Target stakeholder

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Taxonomy: Communication

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Taxonomy: Communication
Workspace awareness tools
Low: it supports only zero or one element
Medium: it supports two elements
High: it supports all elements

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Taxonomy: Communication

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Taxonomy: Communication

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Taxonomy: Management
Infrastructure for managing the life cycle of
the models

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Taxonomy: Management

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Taxonomy: Management

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Open Issues
For each primary study the following data have been
collected:
(i) identified limitations of the proposed approach
(ii) identified challenges that have not been solved in
the current form of the proposed approach
(iii) discussed directions for future work

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Open Issues

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Conclusion
The interest around CoMDSE has been increasing over
the last years
A study analysing, classifying, and comparing
approaches and methods for MDSE was missing
A Systematic Mapping Study has been performed to
• draw a picture of the state of the art about CoMDSE
• identify open issues and future research directions

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