From Bidirectional Model Transformation to Model Synchronization

In model-driven engineering, it is common that there are several related models co-existing. When one model is updated or several models are updated at the same time, we need to propagate the updates across all models to make them consistent. This process is called synchronization. Bidirectional model transformation partially supports the synchronization of two models by updating one model according to the other models. However, it does not work when the two models are modified at the same time. In this work we propose a new algorithm that wraps any bidirectional transformation into a synchronizer, and this synchronizer allows simultaneous updates on the two models. We propose a general algebraic framework for model synchronization, and prove that our algorithm can ensure the synchronization properties if the bidirectional transformation satisfies the correctness property and the hippocraticness property [7].