Section: Partnerships and Cooperations

International Initiatives

Inria Associate Teams

PLOMO

• Title: Customizable Tools and Infrastructure for Software Development and Maintenance

• Inria principal investigator: Stéphane Ducasse

• International Partner (Institution - Laboratory - Researcher):

  • University of Chile (Chile) - PLEIAD

• Duration: 2011–2013

• See also: http://pleiad.dcc.uchile.cl/research/plomo

Project Description

Software maintenance is the process of maintaining a software system by removing bugs, fixing performance issues and adapting it to keep it useful and competitive in an ever-changing environment [50] . Performing effective software maintenance and development is best achieved with effective tool support, provided by a variety of tools, each one presenting a specific kind of information supporting the task at hand [52] . The goal of PLOMO is to develop new meta tools to improve and bring synergy in the existing infrastructure of Pharo (for software development) and the Moose software analysis platform (for software maintenance).

PLOMO will (1) enhance the Opal open compiler infrastructure to support plugin definition, (2) offer an infrastructure for change and event tracking as well as model to compose and manipulate them, (3) work on a layered library of algorithms for the Mondrian visualization engine of Moose, (4) work on new ways of profiling applications. All the efforts will be performed on Pharo and Moose, two platforms heavily used by the RMoD and PLEIAD team.

The artifacts produced by PLOMO will strongly reinforce the Pharo programming language and the Moose software analysis platform. The development and progress of Pharo is structured by RMoD, which has successfully created a strong and dynamic community. Moose is being used to realize consulting activities and it is used as a research platform in about 10 Universities, worldwide. We expect PLOMO to have a strong impact in both the software products and the communities structured around them.

2013 was the third and final year of PLOMO. Due to the success of PLOMO, we have requested a prolongation for another three years (PLOMO2). The PLOMO Associate Team Final Report is available online [37] .

In the following, we present the results from 2013:

Research Visits From RMoD to PLEIAD

• Stéphane Ducasse from November 4 until November 15, 2013.

From PLEIAD to RMoD

• Johan Fabry on 15th of July, 18th and 19th of September 2013

• Alexandre Bergel from December 12 until December 29, 2013

• Alejandro Infante from September 13 until September 21, 2013

• Ronie Salgado in January 2014

Recent Results

In the third year of execution of Plomo, work has focused on:

• GradualTalk Paper accepted at Science of Computer Programming.

• Performance Evolution Blueprint paper at VISSOFT.

• Work on the DIE domain-specific language and the definition of IDE plugins using it was submitted to a journal and is in a second round of revisions.

• Organization of a coding sprint at Santiago in January 2013 (12 participants)

• Participated to three Moose releases (4.7-4.9) (http://www.moosetechnology.org )

• Integrated the Opal Compiler in the Pharo3 development branch.

Future of the Partnership We really hope that the team will be prolongated for a second three year period. The synergy between the two teams is working really well - in terms of exchanges, results and future collaborations.

For more information, we refer to the report PLOMO Associate Team Final Report [37] .

Inria International Partners

Uqbar - Argentina

Participants : Marcus Denker [correspondant] , Stéphane Ducasse [RMoD] , Nicolas Anquetil [RMoD] , Diego Garbervetsky [UBA,LAFHIS] , Gabriela Arevalo [Universidad Nacional de Quilmes)] , Nicolas Passerini [Uqbar] .

Uqbar is a foundation of researchers teaching in several universities of the Buenos Aires area. Universidad Tecnologica Nacional (FRBA) Universidad Nacional de Quilmes, Universidad Nacional de San Martin,Universidad Nacional del Oeste. LAFHIS is a research laboratory from the University of Buenos Aires. More information at (http://www.uqbar-project.org ).

Informal International Partners

We are building an ecosystem around Pharo with international research groups, universities and companies. Several research groups (such as Software Composition Group – Bern, and Pleaid – Santiago) are using Pharo. Many universities are teaching OOP using Pharo and its books. Several companies worldwide are deploying business solutions using Pharo.

Participation In other International Programs

Project Pequi – Inria/CNPq Brésil

The Pequi project is a collaboration between Professor Marco T. Valente's team at the Federal University of Minas Gerais in Brazil and the RMoD team. It focuses in producing Metrics, Techniques, and Tools for Software Remodularization.

It is recognized that software systems must be continuously maintained and evolved to remain useful. However, ongoing maintenance over the years contributes to degrade the quality of a system. Thus reengineering activities, including remodularization activities, are necessary to restore or enhance the maintainability of the systems. To help in the remodularization of software systems, the project will be structured in two main research lines in which both teams have experience and participation: (i) Evaluation and Characterization of Metrics for Software Remodularization; and (ii) Tools and Techniques for Removal of Architectural Violations.

The project started in July 2011 with a visit of Dr. Nicolas Anquetil to the brazilian team. The project lasted 24 months and ended June 2013.