1 Method engineering tools
The specifications of methods in MetaEdit+ are managed with
the MetaEdit+ Method Workbench. Method Workbench includes a set of tools for
creating and modifying method specifications. These method development tools
are:
 | Property
Tool to create property types, like strings or text fields, used by other
method
components. |
 | Object
Tool for specifying object types like Process, State, or Class that are
basic components of
methods. |
 | Relationship
Tool for specifying the connecting components that lie between object types.
Examples of these relationship types are Flow in Data Flow Diagrams, or Message
Connection in Object
Diagrams. |
 | Role
Tool for specifying the components that connect relationship types and
object
types. |
 | Graph
Tool for managing specifications of whole techniques (e.g. Class Diagram,
Data Flow Diagram). Techniques are composed here of Object, Relationship and
Role types defined with other tools, and rules defined here on how these can be
connected. |
 | Object,
Relationship and Role Tools are all very similar, and Graph Tool just adds some
extra graph functions. Common features of these tools are discussed in the
section on Object Tool. |
The following
ancillary tools change the way models made with a method can be represented to
users, i.e. their symbols, property dialogs and code or report generation.
 | Symbol
Editor to specify and edit the graphical representation of elements in a
graph. |
 | Dialog
Editor to edit the layout of the dialogs used for editing the properties of
design
elements. |
 | Report
Browser to specify consistency checks, documentation and code generation for
a technique. This tool is described in the MetaEdit+ User’s guide (Section
4.1). |
In addition to these development tools,
there are tools for managing methods and their components.
 | Metamodel
Browser to browse specifications of techniques by the project they are
defined in, showing the types they contain and relations between them.
|
 | Type
Manager to export method specifications to other MetaEdit+ repositories, and
to remove unwanted method
specifications. |
 | Info
Tool to show information about a given type: which other types it uses, and
which types use it. |
All of these three sets of
tools are also present in the standard version of MetaEdit+. There, however, the
first set of tools only allows viewing existing methods, not modification or
creation; the other tools may be used freely.