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International Symposium on Methodologies for Intelligent Systems

ISMIS 2020: Intelligent Systems in Industrial Applications pp 153–168Cite as

A Conversion of Feature Models into an Executable Representation in Microsoft Excel

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Part of the book series: Studies in Computational Intelligence ((SCI,volume 949))

Abstract

Feature model-based configuration involves selecting desired features from a collection of features (called a feature model) that satisfy pre-defined constraints. Configurator development can be performed by different stakeholders with distinct skills and interests, who could also be non-IT domain experts with limited technical understanding and programming experience. In this context, a simple configuration framework is required to facilitate non-IT stakeholders’ participation in configurator development processes. In this paper, we develop a so-called tool Fm2ExConf that enables stakeholders to represent configuration knowledge as an executable representation in Microsoft Excel. Our tool supports the conversion of a feature model into an Excel-based configurator, which is performed in two steps. In the first step, the tool checks the consistency and anomalies of a feature model. If the feature model is consistent, then it is converted into a corresponding Excel-based configurator. Otherwise, the tool provides corrective explanations that help stakeholders to resolve anomalies before performing the conversion. Besides, in the second step, another type of explanation (which is included in the Excel-based configurator) is provided to help non-IT stakeholders to fix inconsistencies in the configuration phase.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    www.office.com.

  2. 2.

    A diagnosis is a minimal set of constraints, which have to be adapted or deleted from an inconsistent feature model such that the remaining constraints allow the calculation of at least one configuration [6].

  3. 3.

    CSP - Constraint Satisfaction Problem.

  4. 4.

    www.my-boo.com.

  5. 5.

    For further model concepts, we refer to [1, 2].

  6. 6.

    For further details of combining FastDiag with a construction of HSDAG, we refer to [6, 11].

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Graz University of Technology, Graz, Austria

    Viet-Man Le, Thi Ngoc Trang Tran & Alexander Felfernig

Authors
  1. Viet-Man Le
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  2. Thi Ngoc Trang Tran
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  3. Alexander Felfernig
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Correspondence to Viet-Man Le .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Graz University of Technology, Graz, Austria

    Martin Stettinger

  2. University of Klagenfurt, Klagenfurt, Austria

    Gerhard Leitner

  3. Graz University of Technology, Klagenfurt, Austria

    Alexander Felfernig

  4. University of North Carolina, Charlotte, NC, USA

    Zbigniew W. Ras

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Le, VM., Tran, T.N.T., Felfernig, A. (2021). A Conversion of Feature Models into an Executable Representation in Microsoft Excel. In: Stettinger, M., Leitner, G., Felfernig, A., Ras, Z.W. (eds) Intelligent Systems in Industrial Applications. ISMIS 2020. Studies in Computational Intelligence, vol 949. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-67148-8_12

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