Institute of Software Engineering and Programming Languages

M.Sc. Jakob Pietron

My general research interest is the tool usability in the field of Model-driven (Software) Engineering. In the context of my research activity I focus on collaboration features in graphical modeling tools. In addition to technical challenges, collaboration in MDSE creates new needs in terms of user experience. Especially if modelers collaboratively create a model, it becomes important for them to trace changes made by others and understand how a model has evolved over time. The goal of my research is to improve the comprehensibility of evolving models by developing operation-based and fine-grained model history and related exploration techniques.

In addition to modeling tools, I am also interested in the application of the MDSE, especially in the context of the Internet of Things (IoT). Developing and deploying IoT applications from scratch requires a widespread knowledge of different technologies. By encapsulating these heterogeneous technology stack MDSE helps users to develop IoT applications with less effort.

Research Projects

GENIAL!

Tools to accelerate innovation along the automotive value chain

SORRIR

Self-organizing resilient execution platform for IoT services

Topics for Theses and Projects

Enhancing Collaborative Modeling

Context
We are convinced that (graphical) modeling is a cooperative and explorative process done by domain experts. However, several studies identified an insufficient collaboration support of graphical modeling tools. Therefore, we develop a new collaboration approach for graphical modeling tools that is based on the persistence of sequential edit operations (also called operation-based approach). We aim to enable both synchronous as well as asynchronous collaboration and improve the comprehensibility of evolving models.

Problem
At the present stage of our research we persist every kind of edit operation a user has performed to alter the model and present the result in a simple directed acyclic graph (DAG). We are able to filter the edit history by the type of operation or the target of an operation. However, we can not formulate more advanced queries. For instance: "Show only refactoring operations performed by Alice during the last two weeks within this area of the model."

Tasks

  • Develop or extend query language (QL) covers the following dimensions:
    • Syntax, e.g., type of element
    • Semantic, e.g., fulfilment of a requirement
    • Meta information, e.g., time or user
    • Edit operations, e.g., type of edit operation
  • QL should be interactive and should provide live feedback.
  • Conduct a user study to evaluate the user experience of your implementation.

Related Work

Contact

Jakob Pietron

M: Query language for model edit histories (Pietron, Tichy)

Context
We are convinced that (graphical) modeling is a cooperative and explorative process done by domain experts. However, several studies identified an insufficient collaboration support of graphical modeling tools. Therefore, we develop a new collaboration approach for graphical modeling tools that is based on the persistence of sequential edit operations (also called operation-based approach). We aim to enable both synchronous as well as asynchronous collaboration and improve the comprehensibility of evolving models.

Problem
In the context of synchronous collaboration it can happen that two or more users make changes within the same area of a graphical model. This might lead to visually interfering edit operations, e.g., Alice edits the value of a property Prop1 while Bob moves BlockA which contains Prop1. Also semantically conflicting edit operations, such as Bob deletes BlockA instead of moving it, can have a negative impact to the user experience.

We assume that the negative impact of those interfering edit operations can be avoided be implicitly create a temporary branch that delays interfering edit operations of other users.

Tasks

  • Systematically identify different types of be interfering edit operations
  • Develop an algorithm to detect interfering edit operations
  • Implement a solution that uses your algorithm and is able to temporary delay other users edit operations.
  • Conduct a user study that evaluates the impact of your approach on the user experience.

Related Work

Contact

Jakob Pietron

P/B: Reducing of visually interfering edit operations (Pietron, Tichy)

Publications

2022

13.
Pietron, Jakob; Funk, Lenard; Tichy, Matthias
Improving the Comprehension of Evolving Graphical Models
2022 Working Conference on Software Visualization (VISSOFT)
October 2022
DOI:10.1109/VISSOFT55257.2022.00018
12.
Exelmans, Joeri; Pietron, Jakob; Raschke, Alexander; Vangheluwe, Hans; Tichy, Matthias
Optimistic Versioning for Conflict-tolerant Collaborative Blended Modeling
FPVM 2022: 2nd International Workshop on Foundations and Practice of Visual Modeling
July 2022
File:http://ceur-ws.org/Vol-3250/fpvmpaper1.pdf
11.
David, Istvan; Latifaj, Malvina; Pietron, Jakob; Zhang, Weixing; Ciccozzi, Federico; Malavolta, Ivano; Raschke, Alexander; Steghöfer, Jan-Philipp; Hebig, Regina
Blended modeling in commercial and open-source model-driven software engineering tools: A systematic study
Journal of Software and Systems Modeling
June 2022
DOI:10.1007/s10270-022-01010-3
10.
Breckel, Alexander; Pietron, Jakob; Juhnke, Katharina; Sihler, Florian; Tichy, Matthias
A domain-specific language for modeling and analyzing solution spaces for technology roadmapping
Journal of Systems & Software (JSS)
February 2022
DOI:10.1016/j.jss.2021.111094

2021

9.
Pietron, Jakob; Füg, Fabian; Tichy, Matthias
An Operation-based Versioning Approach For Synchronous and Asynchronous Collaboration in Graphical Modeling Tools
FPVM 2021: 1st International Workshop on Foundations and Practice of Visual Modeling, Bergen, Norway
June 2021
File:pdfhttp://ceur-ws.org/Vol-2999/fpvmdata4mdepaper3.pdf
8.
Heß, Alexander; Hauck, Franz J.; Mödinger, David; Pietron, Jakob; Tichy, Matthias; Domaschka, Jörg
Morpheus: A Degradation Framework for Resilient IoT Systems
MeSS'21: International workshop on MDE for Smart IoT Systems, Bergen, Norway (To Appear)
June 2021

2020

7.
Pietron, Jakob
Enhancing Collaborative Modeling
In ACM/IEEE 23rd International Conference on Model Driven Engineering Languages and Systems (MODELS ’20 Companion), October 18–23, 2020, Virtual Event, Canada
October 2020
DOI:10.1145/3417990.3419490
6.
Breckel, Alexander; Pietron, Jakob; Juhnke, Katharina; Tichy, Matthias
A Domain Specific Language and Interactive User Interface for Model-Driven Engineering of Technology Roadmaps
Proceedings of the 46th Euromicro Conference on Software Engineering and Advanced Applications (SEAA 2020), Portorož, Slovenia
August 2020
DOI:10.1109/SEAA51224.2020.00035
5.
Tichy, Matthias; Pietron, Jakob; Mödinger, David; Juhnke, Katharina; Hauck, Franz J.
Experiences with an Internal DSL in the IoT Domain
Proceedings of the 4th International Workshop on Model-Driven Engineering for the Internet-of-Things (MDE4IoT 2020)
July 2020
File:pdfhttp://ceur-ws.org/Vol-2707/mde4iotpaper1.pdf

2019

4.
Domaschka, Jörg; Berger, Christian; Reiser, Hans P.; Eichhammer, Philipp; Griesinger, Frank; Pietron, Jakob; Tichy, Matthias; Hauck, Franz J.; Habiger, Gerhard
Sorrir: A resilient self-organizing middleware for iot applications [position paper]
M4IoT '19: Proceedings of the 6th International Workshop on Middleware and Applications for the Internet of Things
December 2019
DOI:10.1145/3366610.3368098

2018

3.
Pietron, Jakob; Raschke, Alexander; Stegmaier, Michael; Tichy, Matthias; Rukzio, Enrico
Study Design Template for Identifying Usability Issues in Graphical Modeling Tools
2nd Workshop on Tools for Model Driven Engineering (MDETools'18) at MODELS'18, Copenhagen
October 2018
File:pdfhttp://ceur-ws.org/Vol-2245/mdetools_paper_4.pdf

2017

2.
Erb, Benjamin; Meißner, Dominik; Pietron, Jakob; Kargl, Frank
Chronograph: A Distributed Processing Platform for Online and Batch Computations on Event-sourced Graphs
, VolumeDEBS '17 Proceedings of the 11th ACM International Conference on Distributed and Event-based Systems
June 2017
DOI:10.1145/3093742.3093913
1.
Erb, Benjamin; Meißner, Dominik; Habiger, Gerhard; Pietron, Jakob; Kargl, Frank
Consistent retrospective snapshots in distributed event-sourced systems
, Volume2017 International Conference on Networked Systems (NetSys)
March 2017
DOI:10.1109/NetSys.2017.7903947