RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT OF A TECHNOLOGY TO SUPPORT GENERALIZED OBJECT-ORIENTED SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT

BECAUSE EVOLUTION AND CHANGE ARE INEVITABLE FACETS OF SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT, NEW METHODOLOGIES AND TOOLS THAT ARE BASED EVOLUTIONARY LIFE CYCLES ARE NEEDED. TO ADDRESS THIS, AN EFFORT FOR THE RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT OF CASE TECHNOLOGY THAT INTRINSICALLY SUPPORTS ITERATIONAND THAT PROMOTES AN OBJECT-ORIENTED APPROACH THROUGHOUT THE LIFE CYCLE IS PROPOSED. THE APPROACH WILL BE BASED UPON THE USE OF A LIFE CYCLE IN WHICH OBJECT-ORIENTED BUILDING BLOCKS ARE USED TO SPECIFY EXTERNAL BOUNDARIES, INTERNAL ARCHITECTURE, AND IMPLEMENTATION DETAIL. SUCH SPECIFICATIONS WILL BE UNIFIED BY RELATING THEM TO A COMMON, UNDERLYING SEMANTIC MODEL WHICH CHARACTERIZES THE COMPOSITION OF EACH BUILDING BLOCK, THE DEPENDENCIES BETWEEN BUILDING BLOCKS, AND THE ROLE OF EACH BUILDING BLOCK IN EACH FORM OF SPECIFICATION. THE SEMANTIC MODEL WILL ALSO BE USED TO INSURE THE COMPLETENESS AND CONSISTENCY OF DEVELOPMENT INFORMATION. ADDITIONALLY, OPERATIONS (I.E. TOOLS) FOR THECREATION, STORAGE, AND MANIPULATION OF BUILDING BLOCKS WILL BE IDENTIFIED AND EMBEDDED INTO THE SEMANTIC MODEL. ONCE THE METHODOLOGY ANDSEMANTIC MODEL HAVE BEEN FORMALIZED, AN PLAN FOR THE IMPLEMENTATIONOF THE TECHNOLOGY IN THE FORM OF A CASE ENVIRONMENT WILL BE DEVELOPED. THIS IMPLEMENTATION WILL BE BASED UPON THE USE OF OBJECT-ORIENTEDDATA BASE TECHNOLOGY.