Abstract
Front-end design of mobile applications is a complex and multidisciplinary task, where many perspectives intersect and the user experience must be perfectly tailored to the application objectives. However, development of mobile user interactions is still largely a manual task, which yields to high risks of errors, inconsistencies and inefficiencies. In this paper we propose a model-driven approach to mobile application development based on the IFML standard. We propose an extension of the Interaction Flow Modeling Language tailored to mobile applications and we describe our implementation experience that comprises the development of automatic code generators for cross-platform mobile applications based on HTML5, CSS and JavaScript optimized for the Apache Cordova framework. We show the approach at work on a popular mobile application, we report on the application of the approach on an industrial application development project and we provide a productivity comparison with traditional approaches.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
Acerbis, R., Bongio, A., Brambilla, M., Butti, S., Ceri, S., Fraternali, P.: Web applications design and development with webml and webratio 5.0. In: Paige, R.F., Meyer, B. (eds.) TOOLS EUROPE 2008. LNBIP, vol. 11, pp. 392–411. Springer, Heidelberg (2008)
Baresi, L., Garzotto, F., Paolini, P., Paolini, P.: From web sites to web applications: New issues for conceptual modeling. In: ER (Workshops), pp. 89–100 (2000)
Berti, S., Correani, F., Mori, G., Paternò, F., Santoro, C.: Teresa: a transformation-based environment for designing and developing multi-device interfaces. In: CHI Extended Abstracts, pp. 793–794 (2004)
Brambilla, M., Fraternali, P., et al.: The interaction flow modeling language (ifml), version 1.0. Technical report, Object Management Group (OMG) (2014), http://www.ifml.org
Ceri, S., Fraternali, P., Bongio, A., Brambilla, M., Comai, S., Matera, M.: Designing Data-Intensive Web Applications. The Morgan Kaufmann Series in Data Management Systems. Morgan Kaufmann Publishers Inc. (2002)
Conallen, J.: Building Web applications with UML. Addison Wesley (2002)
Groenewegen, D.M., Hemel, Z., Kats, L.C.L., Visser, E.: Webdsl: a domain-specific language for dynamic web applications. In: Harris, G.E. (ed.) OOPSLA Companion, pp. 779–780. ACM (2008)
Gómez, J., Cachero, C., Pastor, O., Pastor, O.: Conceptual modeling of device-independent web applications, pp. 26–39 (2001)
Jacob, R.J.K.: A Specification Language for Direct-Manipulation User Interfaces. ACM Trans. Graph. 5(4), 283–317 (1986)
Leung, K.R.P.H., Hui, L.C.K., Yiu, S.M., Tang, R.W.M.: Modeling Navigation by Statechart. In: Proc. COMPSAC 2000, pp. 41–47 (2000)
Linaje, M., Preciado, J.C., Sánchez-Figueroa, F.: A Method for Model Based Design of Rich Internet Application Interactive User Interfaces. In: Proceedings of International Conference on Web Engineering, Como, Italy, July 16-20, pp. 226–241 (2007)
Mecca, G., Merialdo, P., Atzeni, P., Crescenzi, V., Crescenzi, V.: The (short) araneus guide to web-site development. In: WebDB (Informal Proceedings), pp. 13–18 (1999)
Meixner, G., Seissler, M., Breiner, K.: Model-driven useware engineering. In: Hussmann, H., Meixner, G., Zuehlke, D. (eds.) Model-Driven Development of Advanced User Interfaces. SCI, vol. 340, pp. 1–26. Springer, Heidelberg (2011)
Paternò, F., Santoro, C., Spano, L.D.: Maria: A universal, declarative, multiple abstraction-level language for service-oriented applications in ubiquitous environments. ACM Trans. Comput.-Hum. Interact. 16(4) (2009)
Raneburger, D., Popp, R., Kavaldjian, S., Kaindl, H., Falb, J.: Optimized GUI generation for small screens. In: Hussmann, H., Meixner, G., Zuehlke, D. (eds.) Model-Driven Development of Advanced User Interfaces. SCI, vol. 340, pp. 107–122. Springer, Heidelberg (2011)
Schwabe, D., Rossi, G., Barbosa, S.D.J.: Systematic Hypermedia Application Design with OOHDM. In: Proc. Hypertext 1996, pp. 116–128 (1996)
Schwabe, D., Rossi, G., Rossi, G.: The object-oriented hypermedia design model, pp. 45–46 (1995)
Urbieta, M., Rossi, G., Ginzburg, J., Schwabe, D.: Designing the Interface of Rich Internet Applications. In: Proc. LA-WEB 2007, pp. 144–153 (2007)
Vanderdonckt, J.: A MDA-compliant environment for developing user interfaces of information systems. In: Pastor, Ó., Falcão e Cunha, J. (eds.) CAiSE 2005. LNCS, vol. 3520, pp. 16–31. Springer, Heidelberg (2005)
Vdovják, R., Frăsincar, F., Houben, G.-J., Barna, P.: Engineering Semantic Web Information Systems in Hera. Journal of Web Engineering 1(1-2), 3–26 (2003)
Winckler, M., Palanque, P.: StateWebCharts: A Formal Description Technique Dedicated to Navigation Modelling of Web Applications. In: Jorge, J.A., Jardim Nunes, N., Falcão e Cunha, J. (eds.) DSV-IS 2003. LNCS, vol. 2844, pp. 61–76. Springer, Heidelberg (2003)
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2014 Springer International Publishing Switzerland
About this paper
Cite this paper
Brambilla, M., Mauri, A., Umuhoza, E. (2014). Extending the Interaction Flow Modeling Language (IFML) for Model Driven Development of Mobile Applications Front End. In: Awan, I., Younas, M., Franch, X., Quer, C. (eds) Mobile Web Information Systems. MobiWIS 2014. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 8640. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-10359-4_15
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-10359-4_15
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-10358-7
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-10359-4
eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)