Hurtling back from Paris

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I’m currently hurtling through the French countryside at some significant fraction of the speed of sound on the Eurostar train from Paris to London.  I’m returning from giving a keynote talk at Model Driven Day.  I spoke about UML – Past, Present and Future.   Despite having to put up with my English – my French is ok for ordering a sandwich, but wholly insufficient for conveying the ironies needed for talking about UML - the audience seemed receptive and what feedback I received was good.

I met several old friends, including Jean Bézivin and Philippe Desfray.  Many people introduced themselves to me and wanted to talk about model-driven topics.  Several of them were keen users of DSL Tools and asked about our future plans.  Some were UML users.

I asked everybody I spoke to what they really value in model driven development tools.  These are some of the key points I got from the replies:

  • Being able to integrate models tightly with the code
  • Being able to integrate models in different domains, e.g. business models and UML models
  • Being able to reuse good ideas from UML in custom DSLs without having to deal with the whole thing
  • Being able to describe and validate system architectures

It was a very informative and enjoyable day.