“Kleppe provides a rewarding reading experience. She masterfully blends the valuable insights of both academics and practitioners, and her holistic approach to the subject will benefit software engineers with helpful insights into their craft and tools.”
—Patrick Bailey, Computer Science Department, Calvin College
“With the advent of domain-specific languages in modern software development, an understanding of software language engineering becomes essential for developers. Kleppe offers an erudite and easy-going introduction to the key concepts of the subject.”
—Anders Hessellund, IT University of Copenhagen, Denmark
“Ms. Kleppe has risen to the challenge by successfully combining the traditional theory of text-based programming languages with the brave new world of computer modeling languages into a single comprehensive and consistent conceptual framework. Furthermore, she has done so with wit and style. The text is eminently readable without being condescending, and should please both pragmatically inclined software developers as well as theoreticians who seek abstractions. This is a rare example of a technical book that fully realizes the adage that ‘things should be made as simple as possible, but no simpler.’”
—Bran Selic, Malina Software Corp.
“By finally gathering under one roof the philosophy, concepts, and terminology of language design—and by breaking down many of the needless barriers between graphical and textual languages—this book provides a good introduction for the novice and is a useful refresher for the expert.”
—Dr. Laurence Tratt, Bournemouth University, UK
“Software Language Engineering is an excellent resource for teaching you how to create software languages that are specific to your domain by utilizing a domain modeling approach.”
—Dave Hendricksen, Software Architect
“Languages to define procedures, objects, and intent have proliferated unchecked since Ada Byron. Lady Lovelace first realized in 1830 that some day machines would be programmed. The vast majority of these languages have failed to feature much in the way of design, despite pioneering work by computer scientists such as Niklaus Wirth. But if, as Wirth says, “... precision and perfection are not a dispensable luxury, but a simple necessity,” then language design, in fact precise language design, becomes a critical skill. The advent of general language-modeling languages (like Meta Object Facility) and languages designed to be made domain-specific (like Unified Modeling Language) make this skill even more pressing. No one better understands these issues, or better presents a unified path to precise language design, than Anneke Kleppe. Using clear and concise examples and detailed explanations, this book gives the language designer (and in fact any architect or developer) the background, tools, and skills necessary to design general and domain-specific languages right, the first time. It belongs on the bookshelf of every systems architect and software developer.”
—Richard Mark Soley, Ph.D., Chairman and CEO, Object Management Group, Inc.
“In this book Anneke brings together the “old” knowledge of programming languages with the “new” field of modeling languages. She makes it crystal clear how they complement each other instead of how they compete with each other. I especially like the new term “mogram,” which is the generic term for both model and program. Anyone who is designing or implementing programming languages, modeling languages, or domain specific languages should read this book. It provides the reader with the fundamental background on software language engineering.”
—Jos Warmer, Partner at Odina