CORDET Glossary

This glossary defines the most important technical terms and abbreviations used in the CORDET Project.

Term Short Definition
Abstract Interface A definition of the signature and semantics of a set of related operations without any implementation details.
AOCS The Attitude and Orbit Control Subsystem of satellites.
AOCS Framework An old name for the 'Control Framework' (one of the two software frameworks defined in the CORDET Project).
Application A software program that can be deployed and run as a single executable.
Application Instantiation The process whereby a component-based application is constructed by configuring and linking individual components.
Component Same as 'software component' below.
Component-Based Framework A software framework that has software components as its building blocks.
Computational Node A computational resource that has memory and processing capabilities.
Control Framework A software framework covering on-board control systems, and in particular the Attitude and Orbit Control Subsystem. This is one of the two software frameworks defined in the CORDET Project.
CORBA A widely used middleware infrastructure.
Design Pattern A description of an abstract design solution for a recurrent design problem.
DH The Data Handling Subsystem of satellites.
DH Framework A software framework for the DH subsystem (one of the two software frameworks defined in the CORDET Project).
Domain A shorthand for either 'family domain' or 'framework domain'.
DSL Domain Specific Language (a language that is created to describe applications or components in a very narrow domain).
DTD Document Type Definition. The DTD defines the legal building blocks of an XML document by defining the document structure with a list of legal elements and their legal combinations. Its purpose is similar to that of an XML Schema, although it is not as feature rich and the syntax is different.
EMF A modeling framework and code generation facility for building tools and other applications based on a structured data model.
Family Domain The set of systems whose implementation is supported by a system family.
Feature A characteristic of a system that is relevant to its users.
Feature Model A description of a set of features and their legal combinations.
Framework Domain The set of applications whose implementation is supported by a software framework.
Framework Instantiation The process whereby a software framework is adapted to the needs of a specific application within its domain.
Functional Property A property that can be expressed as a logical relationship among the variables that define the state of an application or system.
Generative Programming A software engineering paradigm that promotes the automatic generation of an implementation from a set of specifications.
Generic Architecture A set of reusable and adaptable software assets to support the instantiation of systems within a certain target domain. In the CORDET project, a generic architecture consists of a system family, to model the non-functional aspects of systems in the architecture's target domain, and a set of software frameworks, to model their functional aspects. The objective of the CORDET Project is to define a generic architecture for satellite on-board systems.
GUI Graphical User Interface.
Interface An abstract specification of services to be provided by any concrete realisation of it.
JNI Java Native Interface, a mechanism for interfacing Java code with non-Java code.
JVM Java Virtual Machine.
Non-Functional Property A property other than a functional property.
Object Oriented Software Framework A software framework that uses inheritance and object composition as its chief adaptation mechanisms.
OBS The On-Board Software.
OtM Adaptability Outside-the-Model Adaptability. An adaptability mechanism that is defined outside the UML2 model.
Product Family A set of applications or systems that can be built from a pool of shared assets.
Property Same as feature above.
Software Component A unit of binary reuse that exposes one or more interfaces and that is seen by its clients only in terms of these interfaces.
Software Framework A kind of product family where the shared assets are software components embedded within an architecture optimized for a certain domain.
System A group of independent but interrelated hardware and software elements comprising a unified whole.
System Family A kind of product family where the 'product' to be built using the reusable assets provided by the family is the architectural infrastructure (the 'middleware') of a complex system.
XML Extensible Markup Language. XML documents consist (mainly) of text and tags, and the tags imply a tree structure upon the document. An XML document is said to be valid if it conforms to an XML Schema or a DTD.
XML Schema A means for defining the structure, contents and semantics of XML documents. XML Schemas are written in an XML-based language called XSD.
WtM Adaptability Within-the-Model Adaptability Mechanism. An adaptability mechanism that is defined within the UML2 model.