A Component-Based Modelling Approach

This paper starts with a consolidated description of widely applied reuse techniques and discusses their drawbacks. As one of the most promising techniques, component-based software development is presented in more detail. Our modeling approach defines three representation techniques for capturing and documenting the essence of component systems. Each one can be represented in two forms, graphically or textually. To further ease modeling complex software systems, we present a general architecture model which structures a system in layers with well-defined tasks. Last, we discuss our view on the task of modeling in contrast to designing and present a list of modeling process activities which can be performed in any order.