From well-formedness to meaning preservation: model refactoring for almost free

Abstract

Modelling languages such as the UML specify well-formedness as constraints on models. For the refactoring of a model to be correct, it must take these constraints into account and check that they are still satisfied after the refactoring has been performed-if not, execution of the refactoring must be refused. By replacing constraint checking with constraint solving, we show how the role of constraints can be lifted from permitting or denying a tentative refactoring to computing additional model changes required for the refactoring to be executable. Thus, to the degree that the semantics of a modelling language is specified using constraints, refactorings based on these constraints are guaranteed to be meaning preserving. To be able to exploit constraints available in the form of a language's well-formedness rules for refactoring, we present a mapping from these rules to the constraint rules required by constraint-based refactoring. Where there are no gaps between well-formedness and (static) semantics of a modelling language, these mappings enable structural refactorings of models at no extra cost; where there are, we identify ways of detecting and filling the gaps.