A Generic Scheme and Properties of Bidirectional Transformations

TL;DR

This paper introduces a generic scheme for bidirectional transformations (BXs), defines desirable properties, and compares existing frameworks to aid developers and users in understanding and designing BX systems.

Contribution

It presents a flexible, generic scheme for BXs, formalizes properties, and provides a comparative survey of existing frameworks.

Findings

A unified scheme can instantiate various BX interfaces.

Desirable properties help characterize and compare BX frameworks.

The survey highlights differences and commonalities among popular BX systems.

Abstract

The recent rise of interest in bidirectional transformations (BXs) has led to the development of many BX frameworks, originating in diverse computer science disciplines. From a user perspective, these frameworks vary significantly in both interface and predictability of the underlying bidirectionalization technique. In this paper we start by presenting a generic BX scheme that can be instantiated to different concrete interfaces, by plugging-in the desired notion of update and traceability. Based on that scheme, we then present several desirable generic properties that may characterize a BX framework, and show how they can be instantiated to concrete interfaces. This generic presentation is useful when exploring the BX design space: it might help developers when designing new frameworks and end-users when comparing existing ones. We support the latter claim, by applying it in a comparative survey of popular existing BX frameworks.