Component-Based Software Engineering. The KobrA Approach

The software industry is pinning its hopes for future software productivity and quality gains on component-based development. However, to date the component paradigm has only really penetrated the "implementation" phase of the software life-cycle, and does not yet play a major role in the earlier analysis and design activities of large software projects. This is evidenced by the fact that in today's technology being a component means being implemented as a JavaBeans, a COM object or a COBRA object. This paper briefly describes a new method for component-based software engineering, known as KobrA, which makes the component concept an integral part of the complete software life cycle. Distinctive features of the method include integrated support for product lines, comprehensive UML-based component modeling, and a systematic process based on a strict separation of concerns.