DE@CAiSE'09

Domain Engineering is an engineering discipline concerned with building reusable assets, such as specification sets, patterns, and components, in specific domains. A domain in this context can be defined as an area of knowledge that uses common concepts for describing phenomena, requirements, problems, capabilities, and solutions. The purpose of domain engineering is to identify, model, construct, catalog, and disseminate artifacts that represent the commonalities and differences within a domain. Although applicable to different engineering disciplines, domain engineering methods has been recently receiving special attention in the information systems era. Some of the reasons for this interest are the increasing variability of applications, the need to obtain and share expertise in different, evolving domains, and the trend towards reusing IS artifacts and knowledge about them.

Domain engineering addresses two main layers: the domain layer, which deals with the representation of domain elements, and the application layer, which deals with information systems artifacts related to the domain. More specifically, information systems applications, their components, and their descriptions are included in the application layer, whereas their common and variable characteristics, as can be described, for example, by ontologies or emerging standards, are generalized and presented in the domain layer.

Similarly to information systems engineering, domain engineering includes three main activities: domain analysis, domain design, and domain implementation, which are carried out in the domain layer. However, domain engineering also supports inter-layer activities, namely interactions that exist between the domain and application layers. Specifically, domain layer artifacts may be used for creation and validation of the specifications of application layer artifacts, while applications may be generalized into domain artifacts in a process of knowledge elicitation.

Domain engineering as a discipline has practical significance as it deals with methods and techniques that may help reduce time-to-market, product cost, and projects risks on one hand, and improve product quality and performance on the other hand.

The purpose of this workshop is to bring together researchers and practitioners in the area of domain engineering in order to define the topic, identify possible points of synergy, common problems and solutions, and discuss visions for the future of the area. In particular, the workshop will focus on the interaction between information systems engineering and domain engineering.

Topics of interest include, but are not limited to:

. Conceptual foundations of domain engineering

. Methods and techniques to support domain engineering

. Ontology engineering

. Development and management of domain assets

. Domain-driven requirements engineering

. Application derivation (i.e., how to use domain artifacts in the application layer)

. Variability management

. Domain engineering techniques in support of reuse, validation, and knowledge management

. Theoretical and empirical evaluation of domain engineering methods and techniques

. Case studies and practice reports related to domain engineering

Submission Guidelines

Prospective workshop participants are invited to submit a paper related to the purpose of the workshop. The workshop will accept three types of submissions:

1. Completed Research - this type of papers should include evidence to support the contribution (e.g. in the form of data analysis, proof of concept, or case studies) and discussion on research findings and their theoretical and practical significance. The paper should not exceed 5,000 words (excluding references and appendices). Accepted completed research papers will be allocated 30 minutes for presentation (including questions & answers) during the workshop.

2. Research-In-Progress - this type of papers can report on research that is under way with preliminary results available at the time of the conference. The paper should not exceed 2,500 words (excluding references and appendices). Accepted research-in-progress papers will be allocated 15 minutes for presentation (including questions & answers) during the workshop.

3. Position papers - this type of papers can include lucid and well-supported statements and suggestions on domain engineering, e.g., directions for the discipline, open questions, criticism on the state-of-the-art, and novel approaches. Accepted position papers will be allocated 15 minutes for presentation (including questions & answers) during the workshop.

All three types of papers may refer to theoretical and/or practical issues.

Papers should be written in Springer LNCS style (see http://www.springer.de/comp/lncs/authors.html for details). The paper type (completed research, research-in-progress, or a position paper) should explicitly be indicated after the paper title. In addition, the paper abstract should not be longer than 150 words. As the workshop will apply double-blind reviews process, the papers should not indicate their authors. Papers should be submitted through the on-line system at http://www.bgu.ac.il/~sturm/DE@CAiSE09/DE_  CAiSE09_Submission.htm.

Publication

The paper selection will be based upon the relevance of a paper to the main topics, on its quality and on the potential to stimulate discussion in the workshop. Accepted papers will be published in the online CAiSE'2009 workshop proceedings. In addition, authors of some selected papers will be asked to consider submitting revised version of the papers as chapters in a book on Domain Engineering to be edited by the workshop co-chairs and published by Springer.

Important dates

Submission deadline: February 16th 2009

Notification of acceptance: March 23rd 2009

Camera-ready papers due: April 13th 2009

Workshop: June 9th 2009

Workshop Co-Chairs

Iris Reinhartz-Berger, University of Haifa, Israel.

Arnon Sturm, Ben Gurion University of the Negev, Israel.

Yair Wand, University of British Columbia, Canada

Workshop Program Committee

Colin Atkinson, University of Mannheim, Germany

Mira Balaban, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Israel

Sholom Cohen, CMU-SEI, USA

Kim Dae-Kyoo, Oakland University, USA

Dov Dori, Technion - Israel Institute of Technology, Israel

Joerg Evermann, Memorial University of Newfoundland, Canada

Jeff Gray, University of Alabama at Birmingham, USA

Atzmon Hen-Tov, Pontis, Israel

Steven Kelly, MetaCase, Finland

Philippe Kruchten, University of British Columbia, Canada

John McGregor, Clemson University, USA

Dirk Muthig, Fraunhofer Institute for Experimental Software Engineering, Germany

Klaus Pohl, University of Duisburg-Essen, Germany

Iris Reinhartz-Berger, University of Haifa, Israel

Michael Rosemann, The University of Queensland, Australia

Julia Rubin, IBM Haifa Research Labs, Israel

Bernhard Rumpe, Braunschweig University of Technology, Germany

Lior Schachter, Pontis, Israel

Klaus Schmid, University of Hildesheim, Germany

Keng Siau, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, USA

Pnina Soffer, University of Haifa, Israel

Il-Yeol Song, Drexel University, USA

Arnon Sturm, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Israel

Giancarlo Succi, the University of Alberta, Canada

Juha-Pekka Tolvanen, MetaCase, Finland

Yair Wand, University of British Columbia, Canada

Gabi Zodik, IBM Haifa Research Labs, Israel

For more information on the workshop, please contact:

Iris Reinhartz-Berger

Department of Management Information Systems University of Haifa Carmel Mountain, Haifa 31905, Israel Phone: 972-4-8288502