Model-driven development of simulation-based system design tools

Abstract

Analysis and validation using simulation is a helpful tool in systems engineering, but requires in-depth knowledge of various aspects of the system itself, used model classes, and an appropriate software tool. Usually, this expertise is spread over a number of team members, thus making it a non-trivial task. A domain-specific simulation-based system design tool (termed here simulation-based application, SBA) could fill this gap. It hides the complexity of the model from the system designer and allows to configure parameters and analyze results in one single application. The necessary extra effort in software development compared to a bare modeling tool can be reduced with techniques for model-driven development. This paper presents an approach to use such methods to improve the development of SBA as a case of domain-specific software product lines. The workflow is described as well as the existing meta-model and applied techniques from model-driven development. The paper also shows the necessary elements of a meta model to describe SBAs. An example shows the complete workflow using an example of a wireless sensor networks for avionic applications.