Semi-automatic Generation of Metamodels and Models From Grammars and Programs

AbstractMost recent languages used in the field of computer science (programming languages, modelling languages, …) are defined by using a grammar-based notation. Although the definition of a language by metamodels is more convenient in terms of understandibility, precision and the ability to reuse abstract concepts from other language definitions, most current textual languages are still missing a complete metamodel. Unfortunately this implies that modern model-based software development tools are not able to process programs written in those languages.We propose a framework which generates a metamodel for each programming language defined by a grammar. Moreover the framework is able to create a compiler which reads programs of the given grammar and produces models which conform to the generated metamodel. The generation of the metamodel can be adjusted by a predefined set of annotations which can be written directly into the grammar, so the generated model is more appropriate for whichever application