Working Group Programming Languages and Compilers

The VL­Eli System Generating Structure-Editors for Visual Languages Keywords: vl-eli, vleli, visual languages, visual programming, visual specification, generator, tool, toolset, declarative, implementation, compiler, translation, code generation, analysis, structure editor, syntax-driven editor, environment, visual pattern, visual abstractions, pattern-based, specification modules, structure tree, attribute evaluator, liga, eli . Categories: VPL-I Environments and Tools for VPLs VPL-IV.D Translators (interpreters and compilers) VPL-VI.A Formal definition of VPLs VPL-VI.D.2 Cognitive and user-interface design issues VL­Eli is a tool set, which makes it easy to implement visual languages. It generates complete environments for visual languages. They contain a structure editor and allow analysis and transformation of visual constructs. Because of the multi-level specification technique and the support of multiple views, VL­Eli is flexible enough to cover a wide range of visual languages. Concepts and Implementation - An overview and further readings Generated Editors - A demonstration of the application domain Strengths and Weaknesses of VL­Eli - A comparison to other systems VL­Eli is still under development. Up to now, there is no complete documentation and no guarantee for backward compatibility of new versions. Because of this, VL­Eli is not publicly accessible at this time. Nevertheless, using VL­Eli is a real alternative to other generators or hand-coding. On demand, we will make VL­Eli available and offer our support. In further development we focus on the family of UML languages and plan an extensive implementation. During this process, we want to complete the available specification mechanisms. In particular, we plan to improve the flexibility of multiple view environments. When finished, the implemented UML-Editor can be used as a basis for the development of new UML tools. Miscellaneous Suggestions for diploma and bachelor theses Files for the VLFM '01 special event Talks and presentation materials WWW Links Other tools for implementation of visual languages The area of visual languages Contact: Carsten Schmidt (cschmidt@uni-paderborn.de) Last update: 12/03/2002