Language Design of the NeoJoin View Definition Language

In the view-based development of cyber-physical systems, developers with different roles and tasks use specific views to access models of the system. Using projective approaches, these views are derived from consistent, underlying models. The views and transformations from and to the underlying models are defined using domain-specific languages. The problem is that existing view definition languages lack either an easy-to-use syntax or sufficiently expressive transformation operators or incremental model-view transformations. In this paper, we propose a syntax for the view definition language NeoJoin based on the concepts of model queries and meta-model descriptions. We evaluate the usability of the proposed syntax with a user study and apply it to an existing case in the domain of smart electricity grids. With the proposed syntax, we aim to provide an easy-to-use, yet universally applicable language for the definition of views in cyber-physical systems development.