Tool specification with GTSL

The definition of software development methods encompasses the definition of syntax and static semantics of formal languages. These languages determine documents to be produced during the application of a method. Developers demand language-based tools that provide document production support, check the syntax and static semantics of documents, and thus implement methods. Method integration must determine inter-document consistency constraints between documents produced in the various tasks. Tools must, therefore, be integrated to implement the required method integration and check or even preserve inter-document consistency. The focus of this paper is on the specification of such integrated tools and outlines the main concepts of the object-oriented tool specification language GTSL (GOODSTEP Tool Specification Language). GOODSTEP is an ESPRIT-III project (no. 6115) to produce a General Object-Oriented Database for SofTware Engineering Processes.