Recording Venue: Skype
Guest: Martin Odersky
Host: Markus
This episode is an update on the developments around the Scala language. We covered the new features in 2.7 and 2.8, as well as what’s planned for 2.9. We then discussed briefly the different “proficiency levels” of Scala programmers. The main part of the episode centered around Martin’s new research project: the polymorphic embedding of DSLs for expressing concurrency into Scala.
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Recording Venue:
Guest(s): Johan Bezem
Host(s): Michael
Our guest Johan Bezem explains the idea behind and the benefits of MISRA. MISRA defines guidelines for C and C++ programming in order to ensure quality. While it got started for embedded automotive development, it is more generally applicable.
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Recording Venue: JAOO 2007
Guest(s): Krzysztof Czarnecki
Host(s): Markus
This episode is the long-awaited (and much requested) interview with Krzysztof Czarnecki, the author, together with Ulrich Eisenecker, of the book Generative Programming.
In the interview we discussed the state of generative programming today and related it to model-driven development and DSLs. We then talked a little bit about product lines in general. We then discussed his current field of research, which currently focusses on framework-specific modeling languages and non-trivial roundtrip engineering.
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Recording Venue: JAOO 2006
Guest(s): Laurence Tratt
Host(s): Markus
This episode is about compile-time metaprogramming, and specifically, about implementing DSLs via compile-time metaprogramming. Our guest, Laurence Tratt, illustrates the idea with his (research) programming language called Converge.
We started by talking about the importance of a custom syntax for DSL and took a brief look at the definition of DSLs by a chap called Paul Hudak. We then briefly covered the disctinction between internal and external DSLs.
More to the point of this episode, we discussed the concept of compile-time metaprogramming, and the language features necessary to achieve it: in converge, these concepts are called splice, quasi-quote and insertion. We then looked at how the Converge compiler works, and at the additional features that are required to implement DSLs based on the metaprogramming features mentioned above. Using an example, we then walked through how to implement a simple DSL.
Looking at some of the more technical details, we discussed the difference between the parse tree and the abstract syntax tree and at different kinds of parsers – specifically, the Earley parser used by Converge. In multi-stage languages (i.e. languages that execute programs and meta programs) error reporting is important, but non trivial. We discussed how this is done in Converge. We finally looked at how to integrate Converge’s expression language into your DSL and how to package DSL definition for later use.
The last segment look at the process of implementing a DSL in converge and about some of the history and practical experience with Converge. Lessons learned from building Converge wrap up the episode.
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Recording Venue: JAOO 2006
Guest(s): Obie Fernandez
Host(s): Markus
In this episode, we’re talking to Obie Fernandez about agile DSL development in Ruby. We started our discussion by defining what a DSL is, the difference between internal and external DSLs as well as the importance of the flexibly syntax of the host language in order to make DSLs worthwhile. We then looked at a couple of real world examples for DSLs, specifically, at Business Natural Languages. We then progressed to the main part of the discussions, which centered around the features of Ruby that are important for building DSLs. These include the flexible handling of parentheses, symbols, blocks as well as literal arrays and hashes. We then discussed Ruby’s meta programming feautures and how they are important for building DSLs: instantiation, method_missing callback, class macros, top level
functions and sandboxing. Features like eval, class_eval, instance_eval and define_method are also important for DSLs in
Ruby, as well as using alias_method for simple AOP.
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Recording Venue:
Guest(s):
Host(s): Eberhard Markus
Recording Venue:
Guest(s):
Host(s): Eberhard Markus
After discussing some of the more technical aspects of MDSD in the last episode, we take a look at other important topics in this one. This includes some tips on how to introduce MDSD into projects and how the development process has to be adapted for this to work, as well as a look at the return on investment for MDSD. The relationship of MDSD and Agile software development is also discussed. Finally, we take a look at offshoring in the context of MDSD.
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Recording Venue:
Guest(s):
Host(s): Eberhard Markus
Recording Venue:
Guest(s):
Host(s): Eberhard Markus
In this Episode, Eberhard and Markus provide an introduction to Model-Driven Software Development. Since the discussion turned out to be too long, we separated things into two episodes, thus Episode 6 will be the second part of this discussion. In this first part we disucsss core concepts of MDSD, the relationship to MDA, and hint at a couple of tools.
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IEEE Software magazine presents Software Experts Summit 2013, which will focus on Smart Data Science: Harnessing Data for Intelligent Decision Making. Scheduled for 17 July at the Microsoft Campus in Redmond, Washington, speakers include James Whittaker of Microsoft, Paul Zikopoulos of IBM, Wolfram Schulte of Microsoft Research, John Howie of Cloud Security Alliance, Ayse Bener of Ryerson University, and Forrest Shull of the Fraunhofer Center for Experimental Software Engineering. Visit www.computer.org/ses13.
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