A continuing challenge for software designers is to develop efficient and cost-effective software implementations. Many see software reuse as a potential solution; however, the cost of reuse tends to outweigh the potential benefits. The costs of software reuse include establishing and maintaining a library of reusable components, searching for applicable components to be reused in a design, as well as adapting components toward a proper implementation. We introduce SPARTACAS, a framework for automating specification-based component retrieval and adaptation that has been successfully applied to synthesis of software for embedded and digital signal processing systems. Using specifications to abstractly represent implementations allows automated theorem-provers to formally verify logical reusability relationships between specifications. These logical relationships are used to evaluate the feasibility of reusing the implementations of components to implement a problem. Retrieving a component that is a complete match to a problem is rare. It is more common to retrieve a component that partially satisfies the requirements of a problem. Such components have to be adapted. Rather than adapting components at the code level, SPARTACAS adapts the behavior of partial matches by imposing interactions with other components at the architecture level. A subproblem is synthesized that specifies the missing functionality required to complete the problem; the subproblem is used to query the library for components to adapt the partial match. The framework was implemented and evaluated empirically, the results suggest that automated adaptation using architectures successfully promotes software reuse, and hierarchically organizes a solution to a design problem.

Reuse is a sound and practical design technique in many engineering disciplines. Although successful instances of software reuse are becoming more common, the cost of reuse tends to outweigh the potential benefits. The costs of software reuse include establishing and maintaining a library of reusable components, searching for applicable components to be reused, as well as adapting components toward a solution to a design problem. In this paper, we present a framework, called SPARTACAS, for automating specification-based component retrieval and adaptation. Components that partially satisfy the constraints of a design problem are adapted using adaptation architectures. Adaptation architectures modify the behavior of a software component by imposing interactions with other components. Based on the functionality specified in the problem and the partially-matched component, a sub-problem that specifies the missing functionality is synthesized. The sub-problem is used to query the library for components for adaptation. The framework was implemented and evaluated empirically, the results suggest that automated adaptation using architectures successfully promotes software reuse, and hierarchically organizes a solution to a design problem.