Component-based development: from buzz to spark

Abstract

Component-based development (CBD) is the building of software systems out of prepackaged generic elements. The current excitement about CBD results from the convergence of four phenomena originating from quite different backgrounds: on the scientific side, the progress of modern software engineering ideas with their special emphasis on reuse. On the industrial side, the widespread success of theoretically unpretentious but practically useful techniques for building GUIs, databases, and other parts of applications out of components. On the political side, the push by some of the major players for competing interconnection technologies: CORBA, COM, and Enterprise JavaBeans. In the software world at large, the generalization of object technology, which provides both the conceptual basis and the practical tools for building and using components. The catalyst behind component-based development is the growing realization by the software industry that something must be done to control the costs of developing software products and boosting their quality.