Software framework
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A software framework is "the skeleton of an application that can be customized by an application developer"[1]. Like software libraries, it aids the software developer by containing source code that solves problems for a given domain and provides a simple API. However, while a code library acts like a servant to other programs, software frameworks reverse the master-servant relationship. This reversal, called inversion of control, is the essence of software frameworks[2].
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[edit] Motivations
Frameworks are designed with the intent of facilitating software development, by allowing designers and programmers to spend more time on meeting software requirements rather than dealing with the more tedious low level details of providing a working system. For example, a team using Apache Struts to develop a banking web site can focus on how account withdrawals are going to work rather than how to control navigation between pages in a bug-free manner. However, there are common complaints that using frameworks adds to "code bloat", and that a result of competing and complementary frameworks is that one trades time spent on rote programming and design for time spent on learning frameworks.
Having a good framework in place allows the developers to spend more time concentrating on the business-specific problem at hand rather than on the plumbing code behind it. Also a framework will limit the choices during development, so it increases productivity, specifically in big and complex systems.
[edit] Types of software frameworks
A software framework can be geared toward building graphical editors for different domains like artistic drawing, music composition, and mechanical CAD. [3][4]. Another software framework can help build compilers for different programming languages and target machines. [5] Yet another might help build financial modeling applications[6] or decision support systems[7]. There are frameworks for multimedia, web applications, and even communicating between different systems.
[edit] Architecture
According to Pree[8], software frameworks consist of frozen spots and hot spots. On the one hand, frozen spots define the overall architecture of a software system, that is to say its basic components and the relationships between them. These remain unchanged (frozen) in any instantiation of the application framework. On the other hand, hot spots represent those parts where the programmers using the framework add their own code to add the functionality specific to their own project.
Software frameworks define the places in the architecture where adaptations for specific functionality should be made - the hot spots. In an object-oriented environment, a framework consists of abstract and concrete classes. Instantiation of such a framework consists of composing and subclassing the existing classes .[9]
When developing a concrete software system with a software framework, the hot spots are specialized according to the specific needs and requirements of the system. Software frameworks rely on the Hollywood Principle: "Don’t call us, we’ll call you."[10] This means that the user-defined classes (for example, new subclasses), receive messages from the predefined framework classes. These are usually handled by implementing superclass abstract methods.
[edit] List of general purpose frameworks
- BFC is a RAD framework for developing database-centric distributed computing applications in a .NET environment.
- CNI (Compiled Native Interface) is a software framework for the GNU GCJ compiler which allows Java code to call and be called by native applications (programs specific to a hardware and operating system platform) and libraries written in C++.
- Component-based Scalable Logical Architecture (CSLA) is a standard way to create robust object oriented programs using business objects, implemented using .NET.
- Java Native Interface (JNI) allows Java code running in the Java virtual machine (VM) to call and be called by native applications (programs specific to a hardware and operating system platform) and libraries written in other languages, such as C, C++ and assembly.
- Leonardi is an open source application framework for GUI applications
- Spring is an open source application framework for the Java platform.
- Symfony is a popular open source application framework for PHP Platform.
- Rails is a libre software application framework for Ruby Platform.
[edit] See also
- Application framework
- Class (computer science)
- Don't repeat yourself
- Enterprise Architecture
- Implicit invocation
- Jini | Upnp | Salutation which have been called coordination frameworks.
- Object-oriented programming
[edit] External links
- Annual frameworks conference
- Frameworks vs. Libraries
- RAS metadata repository for creating software assets and software reuse
[edit] References
- ^ Ralph E. Johnson. Frameworks = (components + patterns). Commun. ACM, 40(10):39--42, 1997.
- ^ Dirk Riehle. Framework Design: A Role Modeling Approach. PhD thesis, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Zurich, 2000.
- ^ Vlissides, J. M. and M. A. Linton (1990). “Unidraw: a framework for building domain-specific graphical editors.” ACM Transactions of Information Systems 8(3): 237-268.
- ^ Johnson, R. E. (1992). Documenting frameworks using patterns. in (eds), ACM Press, proceedings of the Object-oriented programming systems, languages, and applications, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada: 63-76.
- ^ Johnson, R. E., C. McConnell and M. J. Lake (1992). The RTL system: a framework for code optimization. in R. Giegerich and S. L. Graham (eds), Springer-Verlag, proceedings of the International workshop on code generation, Dagstuhl, Germany: 255-274.
- ^ Birrer, A. and T. Eggenschwiler (1993). Frameworks in the financial engineering domain: an experience report. in (eds), Springer-Verlag, proceedings of the European conference on object-oriented programming, Kaiserslautern, Germany: 21-35.
- ^ Gachet, A. (2003) "Software Frameworks for Developing Decision Support Systems - A New Component in the Classification of DSS Development Tools", Journal of Decision Systems 12(3/4): 271-281.
- ^ Pree, W. (1994). Meta patterns - a means for capturing the essentials of reusable object-oriented design. in M. Tokoro and R. Pareschi (eds), Springer-Verlag, proceedings of the ECOOP, Bologna, Italy: 150-162.
- ^ Buschmann, F. (1996). Pattern-oriented software architecture : a system of patterns. Chichester ; New York, Wiley.
- ^ Larman, C. (2002). Applying UML and patterns : an introduction to object-oriented analysis and design and the unified process. Upper Saddle River, NJ, Prentice Hall PTR.
