A General Theory for the Evolution of Application Models -- Full version

TL;DR

This paper develops a comprehensive theoretical framework for understanding the evolution of information systems, emphasizing the distinction between data structures and their operational semantics, applicable across various modeling paradigms.

Contribution

It introduces a general theory for information system evolution, focusing on object typing, relatedness, and well-formedness axioms, adaptable to multiple data modeling techniques.

Findings

Defines a formal concept of evolution for information systems

Proposes axioms for well-formed evolution processes

Applicable to diverse data modeling approaches

Abstract

In this article we focus on evolving information systems. First a delimitation of the concept of evolution is provided, resulting in a first attempt to a general theory for such evolutions. The theory makes a distinction between the underlying information structure at the conceptual level, its evolution on the one hand, and the description and semantics of operations on the information structure and its population on the other hand. Main issues within this theory are object typing, type relatedness and identification of objects. In terms of these concepts, we propose some axioms on the well-formedness of evolution. In this general theory, the underlying data model is a parameter, making the theory applicable for a wide range of modelling techniques, including object-role modelling and object oriented techniques.