Verifying feature-based model templates against well-formedness OCL constraints

Abstract

Feature-based model templates have been recently proposed as a approach for modeling software product lines. Unfortunately, templates are notoriously prone to errors that may go unnoticed for long time. This is because such an error is usually exhibited for some configurations only, and testing all configurations is typically not feasible in practice. In this paper, we present an automated verification procedure for ensuring that no ill-structured template instance will be generated from a correct configuration. We present the formal underpinnings of our proposed approach, analyze its complexity, and demonstrate its practical feasibility through a prototype implementation.