School of Computer Science

ConcernMapper Simple Separation of Concerns for Eclipse

News

ConcernMapper is a plug-in for Eclipse that allows you to organize fields and methods into arbitrary modules called concerns. In brief, ConcernMapper allows you to reorganize the modularity of a software system in a way that suits your needs, without altering its "official" structure or behavior. It also allows you to keep a permanent record of the code associated with various concerns.

ConcernMapper is useful for software developers who repeatedly find themselves having to modify source code which, although conceptually related, is scattered in multiple classes. ConcernMapper is an extremely lightweight and easy-to-use cousin of FEAT. With ConcernMapper, you create a concern representation by simply dragging and dropping Java elements of interest into a view.

ConcernMapper is useful for software engineering researchers by providing a simple and convenient format for associating code with concerns. Concerns can be programmatically generated (e.g., through various feature location algorithms) and loaded directly into the plug-in using a simple API.

Screen Shots

• The main features of ConcernMapper.
• The features of ConcernMapper released with 1.2.0 (inconsistency management, clear view, auto load/save).

System requirements: Eclipse 3.2, Java 1.4. ConcernMapper is currently only tested on Windows.

To install ConcernMapper:

1. From the Eclipse menu bar, select Help | Software Updates | Find and Install...
2. Select "Search for new features to install" and click Next >
3. Click on the New Remote Site... button.
4. For the name, enter "ConcernMapper". For the URL, enter "http://www.cs.mcgill.ca/~martin/cm", and click OK
5. Select the new ConcernMapper entry in the list and click Finish
6. In the list of features to install, select the root node of the ConcernMapper tree, and click Next >
7. Select that you accept the terms of the license agreement, and click Next >
8. Click Finish, and then Install
9. Restart your workspace.

You should now have the ConcernMapper plug-in installed. To get started:

1. Open the Java perspective.
2. Select Window | Reset Perspective. The ConcernMapper View will appear.
3. In the ConcernMapper View, click on the third button from the left to create a concern.
4. Drag and drop elements into your concern...

To update an existing installation of ConcernMapper:

1. Make sure that your version of Eclipse allows compatible updates. Select Window | Preferences | Install/Update and make sure the compatible radio button is selected under Valid updates.
2. Select Help | Software Updates | Manage Configuration
3. Select the ConcernMapper feature.
4. Click on Scan for Updates, and go through the motions.

To obtain the source code of ConcernMapper:

The ConcernMapper source code is provided in the plug-in directory. To obtain the source code:

1. Install ConcernMapper as directed above.
2. Find the directory named ca.mcgill.cs.serg.cm_... in the plugin directory of your Eclipse installation.
3. Access the directory src.

Publications
Martin P. Robillard and Frédéric Weigand-Warr. ConcernMapper: Simple View-Based Separation of Scattered Concerns. In Proceedings of the Eclipse Technology Exchange at OOPSLA, October 2005. (pdf)

Issues