AGG: A Graph Transformation Environment for Modeling and Validation of Software

AGG is a general development environment for algebraic graph transformation systems which follows the interpretative approach. Its special power comes from a very flexible attribution concept. AGG graphs are allowed to be attributed by any kind of Java objects. Graph transformations can be equipped with arbitrary computations on these Java objects described by a Java expression. The AGG environment consists of a graphical user interface comprising several visual editors, an interpreter, and a set of validation tools. The interpreter allows the stepwise transformation of graphs as well as rule applications as long as possible. AGG supports several kinds of validations which comprise graph parsing, consistency checking of graphs and conflict detection in concurrent transformations by critical pair analysis of graph rules. Applications of AGG include graph and rule-based modeling of software, validation of system properties by assigning a graph transformation based semantics to some system model, graph transformation based evolution of software, and the definition of visual languages based on graph grammars.