Towards a comparative analysis of meta-metamodels

Abstract

A cornerstone in Domain-Specific Modeling is the definition of modeling languages. A widely used method to formalize domain-specific languages is the metamodeling approach. There are a huge number of metamodeling languages. The choice of a suitable metamodeling approach is a challenging task because there is often a lack of knowledge about the selection criteria and the offered metamodeling features. In this paper, we analyze a set of metamodeling languages (ARIS, Ecore, GME, GOPPRR, MS DSL Tools, and MS Visio), define a comparison framework, and compare the selected meta-metamodels. The comparison forms a first foundation for solving the selection problem.