Framework for Requirements-Driven System Design Automation

In this paper we present a framework for improving model-driven system design productivity with requirements-driven design automation (RDDA). The key to the proposed approach is to close the semantic gap between requirements, components and architecture by using compatible semantic models for describing product requirements and component capabilities, including constraints. An ontology-based representation language is designed that spans requirements for the application domain, the software design domain (UML meta-schema) and the component domain. Design automation is supported for architecture development by machine-based mapping of desired product/subsystem features and capabilities to library components and by synthesis and maintenance of UML design structure diagrams. The RDDA framework uses standards-based semantic web technologies and can be integrated with exiting modeling tools.