MetaBorg in Action: Examples of Domain-Specific Language Embedding and Assimilation Using Stratego/XT

Abstract

Abstract. General-purpose programming languages provide limited facilities for expressing domain-specific concepts in a natural manner. All domain concepts need to be captured using the same generic syntactic and semantic constructs. Generative programming methods and program transformation techniques can be used to overcome this lack of abstraction in general-purpose languages.In this tutorial we describe the METABORG method for embedding domainspecific languages, tailored syntactically and semantically to the application domain at hand, in a general-purpose language. METABORG is based on Stratego/XT, a language and toolset for the implementation of program transformation systems, which is used for the definition of syntactic embeddings and assimilation of the embedded constructs into the surrounding code.We illustrate METABORG with three examples. JavaSwul is a custom designed language for implementing graphical user-interfaces, which provides high-level abstractions for component composition and event-handling. JavaRegex is a new embedding of regular expression matching and string rewriting. JavaJava is an embedding of Java in Java for generating Java code. For these cases we show how Java programs in these domains become dramatically more readable, and we give an impression of the implementation of the language embeddings.

Model-Based Language Engineering with EMFText

“…We employ metamodel and grammar extension to implement integrated languages that reuse and integrate parts of forms DSL and Java. Note that the idea of integrating DSLs and GPLs is not new and was discussed by many authors (e.g., [35,36,37,38,39]). …”

Domain-Specific Metamodelling Languages for Software Language Engineering

“…Expressions in the DSL are translated into the host language producing a new program completely expressed in the host language that is then evaluated using the standard tools for the host language. Different implementations of this concept have been proposed in the literature-for example, [10,19,37]. Other proposals to simplifying language implementation involve extensible compilers (e.g., the delegating compiler objects approach [25]), grammar extension and inheritance (e.g, [36,38]), and pre-processing (such as, macro-processing [9] or source-to-source transformations [44]).…”

PIL: A Platform Independent Language for Retargetable DSLs

“…Implementing such a transformation is complex, requiring statement lifting. To simplify this type of transformation, PIL/G provides expression block syntax [8]: {| stat* | returnvalue |}, as demonstrated in the second transformation step in Fig. 13.…”