Formalizing DSL semantics for reasoning and conformance testing
conference paper
A Domain Specific Language (DSL) focuses on the essential concepts in a certain problem domain, thus abstracting from low-level implementation details. In combination with code generators, DSLs bring software development closer to domain requirements. The development of DSLs usually centers around the grammar and a code generator; there is little attention for the semantics of the DSL. However, a formal semantics is essential for reasoning about specifications in terms of the DSL (i.e., DSL instances). We argue that the semantics should be expressed independent of a code generator. Thus semantic issues can be revealed that could otherwise remain undetected. We also use the semantics to define the conformance of an implementation to a DSL instance, and to automatically test conformance of the (generated) implementation code to a DSL instance. We illustrate our approach using an industrial prototype DSL for collision prevention. cop. 2014 Springer International Publishing.
TNO Identifier
516485
ISSN
03029743
ISBN
9783319104300
Publisher
Springer Verlag
Source title
12th International Conference on Software Engineering and Formal Methods, SEFM 2014, 1 September 2014 through 5 September 2014, Grenoble
Pages
81-95
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