Designing and Executing Software Architectures Models Using SysADL Studio

This paper introduces SysADL Studio, an architecture modeling tool for software-intensive systems that implements the SysADL language. The tool supports multiple views, cross-view checking, and architecture execution simulation. In SysADL Studio, the architect can design a system using a combination of graphical and textual notations and simulate the execution of the designed architecture using a built-in model simulator. SysADL Studio is a free, open-source tool implemented as a plug-in for Eclipse IDE using well-established frameworks (EMF, Xtext, and Sirius). The tool contributes to the advance of the current architecture design practice by supporting a syntactically correct model, reuse of standard architectural elements, and execution simulation at design-time. The rigorous formalism that grounds the language is also implemented by the tool in an extensive manner, allowing the architect to simulate a model behavior in a controlled environment. It has been successfully used in an academic environment in the last years, by students and researchers in Brazil and France that have evaluated the tool in controlled experiments.