research-article

Textual Variability Modeling Languages: An Overview and Considerations

Authors:

Maurice H. ter Beek,

Holger EichelbergerAuthors Info & Claims

SPLC '19: Proceedings of the 23rd International Systems and Software Product Line Conference - Volume B

Pages 151 - 157

https://doi.org/10.1145/3307630.3342398

Published: 09 September 2019 Publication History

Abstract

During the three decades since the invention of the first variability modeling approach [28], there have been multiple attempts to introduce advanced variability modeling capabilities. More recently, we have seen increased attention on textual variability modeling languages. In this paper, we summarize the main capabilities of state of the art textual variability modeling languages, based on [23], including updates regarding more recent work. Based on this integrated characterization, we provide a discussion of additional concerns, opportunities and challenges that are relevant for designing future (textual) variability modeling languages. The paper also summarizes relevant contributions by the authors as input to further discussions on future (textual) variability modeling languages.

References

[1]

Andreas Abele, Yiannis Papadopoulos, David Servat, Martin Törngren, and Matthias Weber. 2010. The CVM Framework - A Prototype Tool for Compositional Variability Management. In Proceedings of the 4th International Workshop on Variability Modelling of Software-Intensive Systems (VaMoS'10) (ICB Research Report), David Benavides, Don S. Batory, and Paul Grünbacher (Eds.), Vol. 37. Universität Duisburg-Essen, 101--105.

[2]

Mathieu Acher, Philippe Collet, Philippe Lahire, and Robert B. France. 2013. FAMILIAR: A domain-specific language for large scale management of feature models. Science of Computer Programming 78, 6 (2013), 657--681.

Digital Library

[3]

Ali Fouad Al-Azzawi. 2018. PyFML - A Textual Language For Feature Modeling. International Journal of Software Engineering & Applications 9, 1 (2018), 41--53.

[4]

Mauricio Alférez, Mathieu Acher, José A. Galindo, Benoit Baudry, and David Benavides. 2019. Modeling variability in the video domain: language and experience report. Software Quality Journal 27, 1 (2019), 307--347.

Digital Library

[5]

Timo Asikainen, Tomi Männistö, and Timo Soininen. 2006. A Unified Conceptual Foundation for Feature Modelling. In Proceedings of the 10th International Software Product Line Conference (SPLC'06). IEEE, 31--40.

Digital Library

[6]

Don S. Batory. 2005. Feature Models, Grammars, and Propositional Formulas. In Proceedings of the 9th International Software Product Lines Conference (SPLC'05) (LNCS), Henk Obbink and Klaus Pohl (Eds.), Vol. 3714. Springer, 7--20.

Digital Library

[7]

Maurice H. ter Beek and Axel Legay. 2019. Quantitative Variability Modeling and Analysis. In Proceedings of the 13th International Workshop on Variability Modelling of Software-intensive Systems (VaMoS'19). ACM, 13:1--13:2.

Digital Library

[8]

Maurice H. ter Beek and Axel Legay. 2019. Quantitative Variability Modeling and Analysis. International Journal on Software Tools for Technology Transfer (2019).

[9]

Maurice H. ter Beek, Axel Legay, Alberto Lluch Lafuente, and Andrea Vandin. 2018. A framework for quantitative modeling and analysis of highly (re)configurable systems. IEEE Transactions in Software Engineering (2018).

[10]

Maurice H. ter Beek, Axel Legay, Alberto Lluch Lafuente, and Andrea Vandin. 2018. QFLan: A Tool for the Quantitative Analysis of Highly Reconfigurable Systems. In Proceedings of the 22nd International Symposium on Formal Methods (FM'18) (LNCS), Klaus Havelund, Jan Peleska, Bill Roscoe, and Erik de Vink (Eds.), Vol. 10951. Springer, 329--337.

[11]

Thorsten Berger, Ştefan Stănciulescu, Ommund Øgård, Øystein Haugen, Bo Larsen, and Andrzej Wąsowski. 2014. To Connect or Not to Connect: Experiences from Modeling Topological Variability. In Proceedings of the 18th International Software Product Line Conference (SPLC'14). ACM, 330--339.

Digital Library

[12]

Thorsten Berger, Steven She, Rafael Lotufo, Andrzej Wąsowski, and Krzysztof Czarnecki. 2013. A Study of Variability Models and Languages in the Systems Software Domain. IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering 39, 12 (2013), 1611--1640.

Digital Library

[13]

Kacper Bąk, Krzysztof Czarnecki, and Andrzej Wąsowski. 2010. Feature and Meta-Models in Clafer: Mixed, Specialized, and Coupled. In Proceedings of the 3rd International Conference on Software Language Engineering (SLE'10) (LNCS), Brian A. Malloy, Steffen Staab, and Mark van den Brand (Eds.), Vol. 6563. Springer, 102--122.

Digital Library

[14]

Jan Bosch. 2009. From Software Product Lines to Software Ecosystems. In Proceedings of the 13th International Software Product Line Conference (SPLC'09). Carnegie Mellon University, 111--119.

Digital Library

[15]

Hendrik Brummermann, Markus Keunecke, and Klaus Schmid. 2012. Formalizing Distributed Evolution of Variability in Information System Ecosystems. In Proceedings of the 6th International Workshop on Variability Modelling of Software-Intensive Systems (VaMoS'12). ACM, 11--19.

Digital Library

[16]

Dave Clarke, Radu Muschevici, José Proença, Ina Schaefer, and Rudolf Schlatte. 2012. Variability Modelling in the ABS Language. In Proceedings of the 9th International Symposium on Formal Methods for Components and Objects (FMCO'10) (LNCS), Bernhard Aichernig, Frank de Boer, and Marcello Bonsangue (Eds.), Vol. 6957. Springer, 204--224.

Digital Library

[17]

Andreas Classen, Quentin Boucher, and Patrick Heymans. 2011. A text-based approach to feature modelling: Syntax and semantics of TVL. Science of Computer Programming 11, 12 (2011), 1130--1143.

Digital Library

[18]

Krzysztof Czarnecki, Paul Grünbacher, Rick Rabiser, Klaus Schmid, and Andrzej Wąsowski. 2012. Cool Features and Tough Decisions: A Comparison of Variability Modeling Approaches. In Proceedings of the 6th International Workshop on Variability Modelling of Software-Intensive Systems (VaMoS'12). ACM, 173--182.

Digital Library

[19]

Krzysztof Czarnecki, Simon Helsen, and Ulrich Eisenecker. 2005. Staged Configuration through Specialization and Multi-Level Configuration of Feature Models. Software Process Improvement and Practice 10, 2 (2005), 143--169.

[20]

Eelco Dolstra, Gert Florijn, Merijn de Jonge, and Eelco Visser. 2003. Capturing Timeline Variability with Transparent Configuration Environments. In ICSE Workshop on Software Variability Management (SVM'03), Peter Knauber and Jan Bosch (Eds.). IEEE.

[21]

Holger Eichelberger, Christian Kröher, and Klaus Schmid. 2013. An Analysis of Variability Modeling Concepts: Expressiveness vs. Analyzability. In Proceedings of the 13th International Conference on Software Reuse (ICSR'13) (LNCS), John Favaro and Maurizio Morisio (Eds.), Vol. 7925. Springer, 32--48.

[22]

Holger Eichelberger, Cui Qin, Roman Sizonenko, and Klaus Schmid. 2016. Using IVML to Model the Topology of Big Data Processing Pipelines. In Proceedings of the 20th International Systems and Software Product Line Conference (SPLC'16). ACM, 204--208.

Digital Library

[23]

Holger Eichelberger and Klaus Schmid. 2015. Mapping the design-space of textual variability modeling languages: a refined analysis. International Journal on Software Tools for Technology Transfer 17, 5 (2015), 559--584.

Digital Library

[24]

Sascha El-Sharkawy, Stephan Dederichs, and Klaus Schmid. 2012. From Feature Models to Decision Models and Back Again: An Analysis Based on Formal Transformations. In Proceedings of the 16th International Software Product Line Conference (SPLC'12). ACM, 126--135.

Digital Library

[25]

Sascha El-Sharkawy, Adam Krafczyk, and Klaus Schmid. 2015. Analysing the Kconfig Semantics and Its Analysis Tools. In Proceedings of the 14th International Conference on Generative Programming (GPCE'15). ACM, 45--54.

Digital Library

[26]

Martin Fowler. 2010. Domain Specific Languages. Addison-Wesley Professional.

Digital Library

[27]

Paulius Juodisius, Atrisha Sarkar, Raghava Rao Mukkamala, Michał Antkiewicz, Krzysztof Czarnecki, and Andrzej Wąsowski. 2019. Clafer: Lightweight Modeling of Structure, Behaviour, and Variability. The Art, Science, and Engineering of Programming 3, 1 (2019), 2:1--2:62.

[28]

Kyo C. Kang, Sholom G. Cohen, James A. Hess, William E. Novak, and A. Spencer Peterson. 1990. Feature-Oriented Domain Analysis (FODA) Feasibility Study. Technical Report CMU/SEI-90-TR-21. Carnegie Mellon University.

[29]

KConfig Language {n.d.}. http://kernel.org/doc/Documentation/kbuild/kconfig-language.txt.

[30]

Markus Keunecke, Hendrik Brummermann, and Klaus Schmid. 2013. The Feature Pack Approach: Systematically Managing Implementations in Software Ecosystems. In Proceedings of the 8th International Workshop on Variability Modelling of Software-Intensive Systems (VaMoS'14). ACM, 20:1--20:7.

Digital Library

[31]

Anna-Lena Lamprecht, Stefan Naujokat, and Ina Schaefer. 2013. Variability Management beyond Feature Models. IEEE Computer 46, 11 (2013), 48--54.

Digital Library

[32]

Marcilio Mendonça, Moises Branco, and Donald Cowan. 2009. S.P.L.O.T. - Software Product Lines Online Tools. In Companion Proceedings of the 24th Conference on Object-Oriented Programming, Systems, Languages, and Applications (OOPSLA'09). ACM, 761--762.

Digital Library

[33]

Marcilio Mendonça, Andrzej Wąsowski, and Krzysztof Czarnecki. 2009. SAT-based Analysis of Feature Models is Easy. In Proceedings of the 13th International Software Product Line Conference (SPLC'09). Carnegie Mellon University, 231--240.

Digital Library

[34]

Rick Rabiser, Klaus Schmid, Martin Becker, Goetz Botterweck, Matthias Galster, Iris Groher, and Danny Weyns. 2018. A Study and Comparison of Industrial vs. Academic Software Product Line Research Published at SPLC. In Proceedings of the 22nd International Systems and Software Product Line Conference (SPLC'18). ACM, 14--24.

Digital Library

[35]

Marko Rosenmüller, Norbert Siegmund, Thomas Thüm, and Gunter Saake. 2011. Multi-Dimensional Variability Modeling. In Proceedings of the 5th Workshop on Variability Modeling of Software-Intensive Systems (VaMoS'11). ACM, 11--20.

Digital Library

[36]

Klaus Schmid. 2010. Variability Modeling for Distributed Development - A Comparison with established practice. In Proceedings of the 14th International Conference on Software Product Line Engineering (SPLC'10) (LNCS), Jan Bosch and Jaejoon Lee (Eds.), Vol. 6287. Springer, 155--165.

Digital Library

[37]

Klaus Schmid. 2013. Variability Support for Variability-Rich Software Ecosystems. In Proceedings of the 4th International Workshop on Product LinE Approaches in Software Engineering (PLEASE'13). IEEE, 5--8.

[38]

Klaus Schmid and Holger Eichelberger. 2008. Model-Based Implementation of Meta-Variability Constructs: A Case Study using Aspects. In Proceedings of the 2nd International Workshop on Variability Modeling of Software-intensive Systems (VAMOS'08) (ICB Research Report), Patrick Heymans, Kyo C. Kang, Andreas Metzger, and Klaus Pohl (Eds.), Vol. 22. Universität Duisburg-Essen, 63--71.

[39]

Klaus Schmid, Christian Kröher, and Sascha El-Sharkawy. 2018. Variability Modeling with the Integrated Variability Modeling Language (IVML) and EASy-producer. In Proceedings of the 22nd International Systems and Software Product Line Conference (SPLC'18). ACM, 306--306.

Digital Library

[40]

Klaus Schmid, Rick Rabiser, and Paul Grünbacher. 2011. A Comparison of Decision Modeling Approaches in Product Lines. In Proceedings of the 5th International Workshop on Variability Modeling of Software-intensive Systems (VaMoS'11). ACM, 119--126.

Digital Library

[41]

Pierre-Yves Schobbens, Patrick Heymans, and Jean-Christophe Trigaux. 2006. Feature Diagrams: A Survey and a Formal Semantics. In Proceedings of the 14th International Requirements Engineering Conference (RE'06). IEEE, 139--148.

Digital Library

[42]

Arie van Deursen and Paul Klint. 2002. Domain-Specific Language Design Requires Feature Descriptions. Journal of computing and information technology 10, 1 (2002), 1--17.

[43]

Bart Veer and John Dallaway. {n.d.}. The eCos Component Writer's Guide. http://ecos.sourceware.org/docs-latest/cdl-guide/cdl-guide.html.

[44]

Alexander von Rhein, Sven Apel, Christian Kästner, Thomas Thüm, and Ina Schaefer. 2013. The PLA Model: On the Combination of Product-Line Analyses. In Proceedings of the 7th International Workshop on Variability Modelling of Software-intensive Systems (VaMoS'13). ACM, 14:1--14:8.

Digital Library

[45]

Jingang Zhou, Dazhe Zhao, Li Xu, and Jiren Liu. 2012. Do We Need Another Textual Language for Feature Modeling? A Preliminary Evaluation on the XML Based Approach. In Software Engineering Research, Management and Applications 2012, Roger Lee (Ed.). Studies in Computational Intelligence, Vol. 430. Springer, 97--111.

Cited By

Päßler Jter Beek MDamiani FDubslaff CJohnsen ETapia Tarifa S(2025)Feature-Oriented Modelling and Analysis of a Self-Adaptive Robotic SystemFormal Aspects of Computing10.1145/3709159Online publication date: 6-Jan-2025
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3709159
Martinson JMahmood WGyimah JBerger T(2025)FM-PRO: A Feature Modeling ProcessIEEE Transactions on Software Engineering10.1109/TSE.2024.351363551:1(262-282)Online publication date: Jan-2025
https://doi.org/10.1109/TSE.2024.3513635
Ahmmed JCohen MGazzillo PFilkov VRay BZhou M(2024)Towards Automated Configuration DocumentationProceedings of the 39th IEEE/ACM International Conference on Automated Software Engineering10.1145/3691620.3695311(2256-2261)Online publication date: 27-Oct-2024
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3691620.3695311
Show More Cited By

Index Terms

Textual Variability Modeling Languages: An Overview and Considerations
1. Software and its engineering
  1. Software creation and management
    1. Software development techniques
      1. Reusability
        Software product lines
  2. Software notations and tools
    1. System description languages
      1. Specification languages

Recommendations

Yet another textual variability language?: a community effort towards a unified language
SPLC '21: Proceedings of the 25th ACM International Systems and Software Product Line Conference - Volume A

Variability models are commonly used to model commonalities and variability in a product line. There is a large variety of textual formats to represent and store variability models. This variety causes overhead to researchers and practitioners as they ...
Mapping the design-space of textual variability modeling languages: a refined analysis

Variability modeling is a major part of modern product line engineering. Graphical or table-based approaches to variability modeling are focused around abstract models and specialized tools to interact with these models. However, more recently textual ...
A systematic analysis of textual variability modeling languages
SPLC '13: Proceedings of the 17th International Software Product Line Conference

Industrial variability models tend to grow in size and complexity due to ever-increasing functionality and complexity of software systems. Some authors report on variability models specifying several thousands of variabilities. However, traditional ...

Comments

Information & Contributors

Information

Published In

cover image ACM Other conferences

SPLC '19: Proceedings of the 23rd International Systems and Software Product Line Conference - Volume B

September 2019

252 pages

ISBN:9781450366687

DOI:10.1145/3307630

Editors:
Carlos Cetina
University San Jorge, Spain
,
Oscar Díaz
University of the Basque Country, Spain
,
Laurence Duchien
University Lille, France
,
Marianne Huchard
University of Montpellier, France
,
Rick Rabiser
Johannes Kepler University Linz, Austria
,
Camille Salinesi
University Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne, France
,
Christoph Seidl
TU Braunschweig, Germany
,
Xhevahire Tërnava
Sorbonne University, France
,
Leopoldo Teixeira
Federal University of Pernambuco, Brazil
,
Thomas Thüm
TU Braunschweig, Germany
,
Tewfik Ziadi
Sorbonne University, France

Copyright © 2019 ACM.

Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for components of this work owned by others than the author(s) must be honored. Abstracting with credit is permitted. To copy otherwise, or republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, requires prior specific permission and/or a fee. Request permissions from [email protected].

Publisher

Association for Computing Machinery

New York, NY, United States

Publication History

Published: 09 September 2019

Permissions

Request permissions for this article.

Request Permissions

Check for updates

Author Tags

Qualifiers

Research-article

Funding Sources

BMBF (German Ministry of Research and Education)

Conference

SPLC 2019

SPLC 2019: 23rd International Systems and Software Product Line Conference

September 9 - 13, 2019

Paris, France

Acceptance Rates

Overall Acceptance Rate 167 of 463 submissions, 36%

Contributors

Other Metrics

View Article Metrics

Bibliometrics & Citations

Bibliometrics

Article Metrics

28
Total Citations
View Citations
257
Total Downloads

Downloads (Last 12 months)36
Downloads (Last 6 weeks)8

Reflects downloads up to 30 Jan 2025

Other Metrics

View Author Metrics

Citations

Cited By

Päßler Jter Beek MDamiani FDubslaff CJohnsen ETapia Tarifa S(2025)Feature-Oriented Modelling and Analysis of a Self-Adaptive Robotic SystemFormal Aspects of Computing10.1145/3709159Online publication date: 6-Jan-2025
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3709159
Martinson JMahmood WGyimah JBerger T(2025)FM-PRO: A Feature Modeling ProcessIEEE Transactions on Software Engineering10.1109/TSE.2024.351363551:1(262-282)Online publication date: Jan-2025
https://doi.org/10.1109/TSE.2024.3513635
Ahmmed JCohen MGazzillo PFilkov VRay BZhou M(2024)Towards Automated Configuration DocumentationProceedings of the 39th IEEE/ACM International Conference on Automated Software Engineering10.1145/3691620.3695311(2256-2261)Online publication date: 27-Oct-2024
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3691620.3695311
Bittner PSchultheiß AMoosherr BYoung JTeixeira LWalkingshaw EAtaei PThüm T(2024)On the Expressive Power of Languages for Static VariabilityProceedings of the ACM on Programming Languages10.1145/36897478:OOPSLA2(1018-1050)Online publication date: 8-Oct-2024
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3689747
Azonhoumon V(2024)Design of a Meta-Factory for Product Lines Model-Driven SoftwareProceedings of the 28th ACM International Systems and Software Product Line Conference10.1145/3646548.3676545(6-10)Online publication date: 2-Sep-2024
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3646548.3676545
Sundermann CBrancaccio VKuiter EKrieter SHeß TThüm T(2024)Collecting Feature Models from the Literature: A Comprehensive Dataset for Benchmarking28th ACM International Systems and Software Product Line Conference10.1145/3646548.3672590(54-65)Online publication date: 2-Sep-2024
https://doi.org/10.1145/3646548.3672590
Becker MRabiser RBotterweck G(2024)Not Quite There Yet: Remaining Challenges in Systems and Software Product Line Engineering as Perceived by Industry PractitionersProceedings of the 28th ACM International Systems and Software Product Line Conference10.1145/3646548.3672587(179-190)Online publication date: 2-Sep-2024
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3646548.3672587
Restrepo CRobin JMazo REgyed AWimmer MChechik MCombemale B(2024)Extensions and Scalability Experiments of a Generic Model-Driven Architecture for Variability Model ReasoningProceedings of the ACM/IEEE 27th International Conference on Model Driven Engineering Languages and Systems10.1145/3640310.3674090(126-137)Online publication date: 22-Sep-2024
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3640310.3674090
Basile Dter Beek MFantechi AGnesi S(2024)Coherent Modal Transition Systems RefinementJournal of Logical and Algebraic Methods in Programming10.1016/j.jlamp.2024.100954(100954)Online publication date: Feb-2024
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jlamp.2024.100954
Krapf PBerthier SLevy N(2023)Product Line Management with Graphical MBSE ViewsElectronic Proceedings in Theoretical Computer Science10.4204/EPTCS.392.4392(53-65)Online publication date: 31-Oct-2023
https://doi.org/10.4204/EPTCS.392.4
Show More Cited By

View Options

Login options

Check if you have access through your login credentials or your institution to get full access on this article.

Full Access

Get this Publication

View options

PDF

View or Download as a PDF file.

eReader

View online with eReader.

Figures

Tables

Media

View Table of Conten