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  • Will Polyglotism and DSLs make Java the Last Big Language?

    Ola Bini argues that the world will not have a new big language again because developers will find value in choosing different languages depending on their problem domain. Similarly Martin Folwer says that programmers will choose a language for what it can do in the same way that they choose frameworks now. On the other hand Joe Winchester debates that you can only be master of one language.

  • WebDSL: Lessons Learned from Creating a DSL

    In this article, Eelco Visser summarizes his approach to design WebDSL, a domain-specific language for developing dynamic web applications with a rich data model with a target architecture based on JBoss's Seam. He discusses paradigms and challenges of Language Engineering while sharing some of the lessons he learned along the way.

  • Presentation: Business Natural Languages Development in Ruby

    In this presentation, Jay Fields introduces his concept of Business Natural Languages (BNL). BNLs are a type of Domain Specific Language, designed to be readable by any subject matter expert, which allows to create maintainable specifications and documentation. The example languages are implemented using Ruby.

  • A Fair Comparison of REST and WS-* using an Architectural Decision Framework: is the Debate Over?

    Olaf Zimmermann and his colleagues have developed a general Architectural Decision Framework. In this paper presented at WWW 2008, they demonstrate how this framework can be used to compare REST and WS-* an possibly end an almost decade long debate.

  • Making the Business Case for Software Factories

    In this article, the authors have tried to carefully quantify the benefits of using a Software Factory Methodology for automating repetitive developments in a large enterprise development project at Siemens.

  • MountainWest RubyConf 2008 Videos

    The videos from MountainWest RubyConf 2008 are all available for downloading from the Confreaks website. We selected a few videos and provide an overview and some entry points into the talks.

  • Article: Building Domain Specific Languages on the CLR

    Ayende Rahien describes how to build internal DSLs on the CLR. He compares different .NET languages as suitable host languages for DSLs and presents Boo as an ideal candidate due to its meta programming facilities, flexibility, and performance.

  • Text Template Transformation Toolkit in Visual Studio 2008

    Visual Studio 2008 includes a Text Template Transformation Toolkit as part of Domain-Specific Language Tools, and can be used to generate code based on a text template.

  • Insights: You don't need your DSL to be English-like

    There is a widespread opinion that a good DSL has to be English-like. Dave Thomas advocates against such approach asserting that DSL are not about getting as close as possible to natural languages and that having this as a guiding principle of DSL design can be rather detrimental. He also highlights what he believes is important in DSL design and provides some examples of successful DSL.

  • Presentation: Scala: Bringing Future Languages to the JVM

    In this presentation, Lex Spoon discusses the Scala programming language. Topics covered include the origin of Scala, the philosophy behind Scala, the Scala feature set, Object-Oriented and Functional programming in Scala, examples of Scala code, writing DSLs, how Scala is converted into Java, Scala performance, Abstract Data Types, unapply, actors and partial functions.

  • Using JRuby to generate Code for the JVM

    While JRuby's performance keeps increasing, there are still algorithms that are faster if implemented in Java. We look at different approaches to solve this: RubyInline for JRuby, generating bytecode with a JRuby DSL and a new subset of Ruby called Duby.

  • Microsoft Releases Web Service Software Factory Modeling Edition

    Microsoft released last week WSSF - Modeling Edition, a major release of the Web Service Software Factory. Don Smith, product manager in the Pattern & Practices team, unveiled an ambitious road map for this factory which is now fully integration the DSL vision set forth by Steve Cook's team.

  • Presentation: Ruby and the Art of Domain Specific Languages

    Rich Kilmer gives an introduction to the art of creating Domain Specific Languages in Ruby. The presentation gives a basic introduction, but moves on to useful distinctions in DSL styles, such as implicit vs. explicit internal DSLs or declarative vs. imperative DSLs. A look at a long list of real world DSLs Rich has created rounds of the presentation.

  • Creating Domain Specific Languages with Groovy

    Today marked the first day of the Groovy/Grails Experience, also known as 2GX, in Reston, Virginia. The conference spans three days and includes forty 90-minute sessions, panel discussions and code workshops. One of the first sessions of the day was Venkat Subramaniam's "DSL In Groovy." Venkat provided a thorough discussion on DSLs and how Groovy eases the creation and usage of them.

  • Glimmer - using JRuby and SWT for Eclipse RCP apps

    Glimmer is a library for building GUIs with JRuby and SWT. Using the Builder idiom, it allows to define GUIs very quickly, but also permits to access SWT APIs directly. Glimmer was recently proposed as an official Eclipse project, so we caught up with Andy Maleh to talk about the project.

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