Integrating heterogeneous components in software supply chains

Abstract

Numerous software product lines today are built from components supplied by different vendors. Companies situated in the middle of a software supply chain must configure and integrate components from their suppliers and offer (partially configured) variants for their customers, who can then complete the configuration and use these components in product lines or products that they develop. Covering the entire product line often involves using components from multiple suppliers, many of which providing overlapping functionality. This leads to a product line with different possible alternatives for components. These components may use mismatched interfaces and therefore require glue for integration. In this paper we analyze the consequences of combining heterogeneous components - components that are not designed using a common architecture - in a product line. We describe the limitations of the current practice and the challenges that arise from combining such components and delivering partially configured products. We introduce a new variability pattern that allows us to deal with heterogeneous components implementing overlapping functionality. This pattern consists of a reference architectural model, as well as transformations that generate a partially configured application including artifacts for gluing mismatched components. © 2010 ACM.