A semi-automatic approach for bridging DSMLs with UML

The definition of modeling languages is a key-prerequisite for model-driven engineering (MDE). In this respect, domain-specific languages (DSL) defined in terms of metamodels and UML profiles are often considered as two alternatives. For interoperability reasons, however, the need arises to bridge modeling languages originally defined as DSLs to UML profiles by defining (1) a specific UML profile to represent the domain-specific modeling concepts in UML and (2) model transformations for transforming DSL models to UML models and vice versa. A manual definition of a UML profile typically is a tedious and errorprone task, but contains a high potential for automation. The contribution of this paper is to integrate the so far competing worlds of DSLs and UML. We report on our semi-automatic approach based on the manual mapping of domain-specific metamodels and UML using a dedicated bridging language as well as the automatic generation of UML profiles and model transformations. We present our ideas within a case study for bridging ComputerAssociate’s DSL of the AllFusion Gen CASE tool with IBM’s Rational Software Modeler for UML.