TITLE: Survey and Classification of Software Product Line Variability Modelling Techniques.

AUTHOR(S): Paul Istoan, Jacques Klein, Gilles Perrouin, Jean-Marc Jezequel. KEYWORDS: Software Product Lines, Variability, Model, Meta-Model, Evaluation. Variability Model, By Rafat A. AL-msiedeen @2012. DATE: 2011. REFERENCE: [1] P. Istoan, J. Klein, G. Perrouin, and J.-M. Jezequel, Survey and Classification of Software Product Line Variability Modelling Techniques.," 2011. ABSTRACT: Software Product Line (SPL) engineering has gained a lot of attention in recent years from the software development community. Variability is the key characteristic of SPL engineering. One of the main software product line objectives is the management of Variability; the term variability refers to the ability or the tendency to change. The exact goal of variability within a product line it is to maximize the return on

investment for building and maintaining products over a specified period of time or number of products. Variability Realization Techniques are refers to the different ways to implement variation points.

The management of variability in a SPL is a delicate and complex process. The set of steps to adequately complete this process include: 1) identification of variability: determines where variability is needed in the product line. 2) Constraining variability: provides just enough flexibility for current and future system needs. 3) Implementing variability: selects a suitable variability realization technique based on the previously determined constraints. 4) Managing variability: requires constant feature maintenance and repopulation of variant features.

The problems may that are affect the introduction, modeling and management of variability in a SPL include: 1) the need of a first-class representation for features and variation points, lacking from most variability modeling techniques. 2) Dependencies between architectural elements and features are rarely made explicit. 3) Software configuration management tools fail to support important variability management aspects. 4) Lack of methods, techniques and guidelines to help select the optimal life cycle phase when variation points should be introduced, extended or bound. 5) Selecting of variability mechanisms without considering their specific advantages and disadvantages. 1