EiffelStudio
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EiffelStudio is a development environment for the
Eiffel programming language Eiffel is an object-oriented programming language designed by Bertrand Meyer (an object-orientation proponent and author of '' Object-Oriented Software Construction'') and Eiffel Software. Meyer conceived the language in 1985 with the goal of i ...
developed and distributed by Eiffel Software. EiffelStudio includes a combination of tools integrated under a single user interface: compiler, interpreter, debugger, browser, metrics tool, profiler, diagram and code inspector tool. The user interface rests on a number of specific UI paradigms, in particular "pick-and-drop" for effective browsing. EiffelStudio is available on a number of platforms including
Windows Windows is a group of several proprietary graphical operating system families developed and marketed by Microsoft. Each family caters to a certain sector of the computing industry. For example, Windows NT for consumers, Windows Server for serv ...
,
Linux Linux ( or ) is a family of open-source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991, by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged as a Linux distribution, which ...
,
Mac OS Two major famlies of Mac operating systems were developed by Apple Inc. In 1984, Apple debuted the operating system that is now known as the "Classic" Mac OS with its release of the original Macintosh System Software. The system, rebranded "M ...
,
Solaris Solaris may refer to: Arts and entertainment Literature, television and film * ''Solaris'' (novel), a 1961 science fiction novel by Stanisław Lem ** ''Solaris'' (1968 film), directed by Boris Nirenburg ** ''Solaris'' (1972 film), directed by ...
, VMS, RaspberryPi. The source is available under
GPL The GNU General Public License (GNU GPL or simply GPL) is a series of widely used free software licenses that guarantee end users the four freedoms to run, study, share, and modify the software. The license was the first copyleft for general u ...
; other commercial licenses are also available.


Status, license and community process

EiffelStudio is an
open-source Open source is source code that is made freely available for possible modification and redistribution. Products include permission to use the source code, design documents, or content of the product. The open-source model is a decentralized sof ...
development with beta versions of the next release made regularly available. The Eiffel community actively participates in its development; its official website i
Eiffel.org
where projects and resources are listed. The source code base is usually available for check-out via
Subversion Subversion () refers to a process by which the values and principles of a system in place are contradicted or reversed in an attempt to transform the established social order and its structures of power, authority, hierarchy, and social norms. Sub ...
or
Git Git () is a distributed version control system: tracking changes in any set of files, usually used for coordinating work among programmers collaboratively developing source code during software development. Its goals include speed, data in ...
. Also available are discussion forums and the like.


Compilation technology

EiffelStudio uses a specific compilation technology known as Melting Ice (claimed by Eiffel Software as a trademark) which integrates compilation proper with interpretation of the elements changed since the last compilation, for very fast turnaround (recompilation time proportional to the size of the change, not the size of the overall program). Although such "melted" programs can be delivered, the common practice is to perform a "finalization" step before release. Finalization is a highly optimized form of compilation, which takes longer but generates optimized executables. The interpreter part of EiffelStudio relies on a
bytecode Bytecode (also called portable code or p-code) is a form of instruction set designed for efficient execution by a software interpreter. Unlike human-readable source code, bytecodes are compact numeric codes, constants, and references (norma ...
-oriented
virtual machine In computing, a virtual machine (VM) is the virtualization/emulation of a computer system. Virtual machines are based on computer architectures and provide functionality of a physical computer. Their implementations may involve specialized hardw ...
. The compiler generates either C or .NET CIL (Common Intermediate Language).


Round-trip engineering

The Diagram Tool of EiffelStudio provides a graphical view of software structures. It can be used in both * Forward engineering, as a design tool for producing software from graphical descriptions. * Reverse engineering, automatically producing graphical representations of existing program texts. The tool guarantees integrity of changes made in either style, for full "roundtrip engineering". The graphical notation is either
BON ''Bon'', also spelled Bön () and also known as Yungdrung Bon (, "eternal Bon"), is a Tibetan religious tradition with many similarities to Tibetan Buddhism and also many unique features.Samuel 2012, pp. 220-221. Bon initially developed in t ...
(the Business Object Notation, see bibliography) or
UML The Unified Modeling Language (UML) is a general-purpose, developmental modeling language in the field of software engineering that is intended to provide a standard way to visualize the design of a system. The creation of UML was originally m ...
. BON is the default.


User interface paradigm

EiffelStudio makes it possible to display many different views of classes and features: text view (full program text), contract view (interface only, with
contracts A contract is a legally enforceable agreement between two or more parties that creates, defines, and governs mutual rights and obligations between them. A contract typically involves the transfer of goods, services, money, or a promise to tran ...
), flat view (which includes inherited features), clients (all the classes and features that use a given class or feature), inheritance history (what happens to a feature up and down the inheritance structure) and many others. EiffelStudio relies on an original
user interface In the industrial design field of human–computer interaction, a user interface (UI) is the space where interactions between humans and machines occur. The goal of this interaction is to allow effective operation and control of the machine f ...
paradigm based on "development objects", "pebbles" and "holes". In the same way that
object-oriented Object-oriented programming (OOP) is a programming paradigm based on the concept of "objects", which can contain data and code. The data is in the form of fields (often known as attributes or ''properties''), and the code is in the form of pro ...
in Eiffel deal with objects during execution, developers deal with abstractions representing classes, features, breakpoints (for debugging), clusters (groups of classes) and other development objects. A development object in EiffelStudio can be selected (picked) wherever it appears in the interface, and regardless of its visual representation (name of the object, visual symbol or other). To pick a development object it suffices to right-click on it. The cursor then changes into a special symbol or pebble corresponding to the type of the object: "bubble" (ellipse) for a class, dot for a breakpoint, cross for a feature etc. As you move the cursor a line is displayed from the original object to the current position. You can then drop the pebble into any matching place: either an icon representing a hole with the same overall shape (class hole, breakpoint hole, feature hole etc.) or a window with a compatible type. The effect of dropping a pebble into a tool is to retarget the entire tool to the development object that was "picked". For example, a class tool will now display the chosen class, in whatever view (text, contract, flat etc.) was selected. This is known as the "Pick-and-Drop" paradigm. The combination of multiple views and Pick-and-Drop makes it possible to browse quickly through complex systems, and to follow the sometimes extended transformations that features undergo under inheritance: renaming, redefinition, undefinition.


Unit and integration testing

EiffelStudio includes an integrated testing facility called EiffelStudio AutoTest''

whereby developers may build simple to sophisticated unit and integration testing suites. The EiffelStudio AutoTest facilities enable the developer to execute and test Eiffel class code from the feature level (e.g. unit testing) to entire class systems (e.g. integration). As such, execution of this code also executes the contracts of the features and attributes executed. As such, EiffelStudio AutoTest is a means to exercising the "tests" or assumptions of the Design by Contract conditions. Therefore, unit and integration testing need not re-test through means of assertions or test oracles what has already been coded as specification in the contracts of the class text. EiffelStudio AutoTest provides the user with three methods of test case creation. First, for manually created tests EiffelStudio AutoTest creates a test class containing a framework for the test. The user needs only supply the test code itself. Second, EiffelStudio AutoTest provides a method for creating a new test based on an application failure at runtime. This type of test is called ''extracted''. If while running the target system, an unexpected failure occurs, EiffelStudio AutoTest can work from the information available in the debugger to create a new test that will reproduce the state and the calls that caused the failure. Once the problem is fixed, the extracted test can be added to the test suite as a hedge against regressions of the problem. The third method of creating tests produces what are called ''generated'' tests. In this scenario, the user provides EiffelStudio AutoTest with the classes for which tests should be generated and some additional information used to control the test generation. The tool then begins calling routines in the target classes using randomized argument values. For every unique
postcondition In computer programming, a postcondition is a condition or predicate that must always be true just after the execution of some section of code or after an operation in a formal specification. Postconditions are sometimes tested using assertions wit ...
or
class invariant In computer programming, specifically object-oriented programming, a class invariant (or type invariant) is an invariant used for constraining objects of a class. Methods of the class should preserve the invariant. The class invariant constrain ...
violation, EiffelStudio AutoTest produces a single new test reproducing the failing call.


History

EiffelStudio traces its roots to the first implementation of Eiffel, by Interactive Software Engineering Inc. (predecessor of Eiffel Software), released in 1986. The origin of the current technology appears to go back to "EiffelBench", started in 1990 in connection with the design of the Eiffel 3 version of the language (as documented in ''Eiffel: The Language'', see bibliography). EiffelBench was renamed "EiffelStudio" around 2001; this is also the time when the environment went beyond its Unix origins to target Windows and other platforms. Major releases since 2001, and some of the new features for each, have been: * 5.0, July 2001: first version to be "EiffelStudio" proper; integration of previous "EiffelCase" tool for graphical design with EiffelBench, in the form of EiffelStudio's Diagram Tool) * 5.1, December 2001: first version to support .NET
press release
(PDF)). It was called "Eiffel#" before releasin

* 5.2, November 2002: new EiffelBuild for GUI design, extended debugging, new mechanisms for C and C++ integration, better roundtripping facilities for the Diagram Tool
press release
. * 5.3, March 2003: Incremental compiler technology available for Eiffel .NET. Eiffel2Java Java interface, EiffelStore (relational database interface) now available for .NET, first Mac OS version, performance enhancements

. * 5.4, November 2003: new conversion mechanism, major run-time performance improvements (in particular for Eiffel (programming language)#Agents, agents), major compilation speed improvements, improved support for multithreading, major EiffelBuild enhancements, first support for new mechanisms as defined by the ECMA Eiffel committee, support for preconditions and postconditions in external (e.g. C) routines, transparent way to call overloaded .NET routines from Eiffel
press release
. * 5.5, September 2004: docking, improved debugger, new ECMA language features

. * 5.6, August 2005: enhanced diagram tool (UML support, force-directed graphs, better roundtripping), new EiffelCOM wizard for generation of Microsoft COM components, better class completion, faster .NET code generation
press release
. * 5.7, October 2006: ISO/ECMA Eiffel addition (inline agents, new "expanded" semantics, named tuples,
Unicode Unicode, formally The Unicode Standard,The formal version reference is is an information technology Technical standard, standard for the consistent character encoding, encoding, representation, and handling of Character (computing), text expre ...
support), refactoring facilities, new way to configure a project system, metrics
press release
. * 6.0, June 2007: ISO/ECMA Eiffel addition (multiple constraint genericity, octal and binary notation for integers), new tabbed editor, new docking facilities to let user define their workspace, context menu is available in addition to pick and drop, dependency tool

. * 6.1, November 2007:

. * 6.2, May 2008:

. * 6.3, December 2008:

. * 6.4, June 2009:

. * 6.5, November 2009:

. * 6.6, May 2010:

. * 6.7, November 2010:

. * 6.8, May 2011. Includes the first implementation of facilities supporting
SCOOP Scoop, Scoops or The scoop may refer to: Objects * Scoop (tool), a shovel-like tool, particularly one deep and curved, used in digging * Scoop (machine part), a component of machinery to carry things * Scoop stretcher, a device used for casualt ...
, ''Simple Concurrent Object-Oriented Programming''.
press release
. * 7.0, November 2011. Includes performance and functional enhancements to the
SCOOP Scoop, Scoops or The scoop may refer to: Objects * Scoop (tool), a shovel-like tool, particularly one deep and curved, used in digging * Scoop (machine part), a component of machinery to carry things * Scoop stretcher, a device used for casualt ...
parallel development facility, GUI library and tool support for
ribbon A ribbon or riband is a thin band of material, typically cloth but also plastic or sometimes metal, used primarily as decorative binding and tying. Cloth ribbons are made of natural materials such as silk, cotton, and jute and of synthetic mater ...
interface structures, improved support for void-safe software development, and many other improvements. * 7.1, June 2012. Includes
SCOOP Scoop, Scoops or The scoop may refer to: Objects * Scoop (tool), a shovel-like tool, particularly one deep and curved, used in digging * Scoop (machine part), a component of machinery to carry things * Scoop stretcher, a device used for casualt ...
processor garbage collection. Multiple improvements to Eiffel Information System linking application code to appropriate external resources such as requirements documents. * 7.2, February 2013. * 7.3, July 2013. * 13.11, December 2013. This release marks the beginning of using
new version numbering scheme

Release note

press release
. * 14.05, May 2014. Includes new Eiffel Inspector tool (static analysis tool to help maintaining a high code quality).
press release
. * 15.01, January 2015. New SCOOP runtime brings significant performance improvement.
press release
. * 15.08, August 2015. Improved EiffelWeb solution to build web server application.
press release
. * 15.12, December 2015. Language improvements (new agent's type notation).
press release
. * 16.05, May 2016. Maintenance release.
press release
. * 17.01, January 2017. Library capability mechanism to document and enforce supported compilation options. Code templates.
17.01 release
* 17.05, May 2017. Better detection of obsolete features. Pick&drop for local variables.
17.05 release
* 18.01, February 2018. Deeper integrated code analyzer. Improved type rules for conditional expressions and manifest arrays. Class features.
18.01 release
. * 18.07, July 2018. Relaxed rules for class features. Subsequent bracket expressions. Remote project targets.
18.07 release
. * 18.11, December 2018. All containers can be used in the iteration form of a loop, and the linear ones can be initialized from others.
18.11 release
. * 19.05, May 2019. Unicode operators, HiDPI, dead 'class' removal, compiler optimizations.
19.05 release
. * 20.05, May 2020. Multi-branch expression, untyped manifest string evaluation based on content.
20.05 release
. * 20.11, November 2020. Once classes, WrapC.
20.11 release
. * 21.11, November 2021. Moving to GTK3 for Linux, Unix and a better presence on MAC OS, new Source control tool.
21.11 release
. * 22.05, May 2022. Source control tool and UI improvements.
22.05 release
. * 22.12, December 2022. New platform, ARM support
22.12 release
.


Code analyzer

Code analyzer (former ''Inspector Eiffel'') is an automated
Eiffel Eiffel may refer to: Places * Eiffel Peak, a summit in Alberta, Canada * Champ de Mars – Tour Eiffel station, Paris, France; a transit station Structures * Eiffel Tower, in Paris, France, designed by Gustave Eiffel * Eiffel Bridge, Ungheni, M ...
software testing Software testing is the act of examining the artifacts and the behavior of the software under test by validation and verification. Software testing can also provide an objective, independent view of the software to allow the business to apprecia ...
and
static analysis Static analysis, static projection, or static scoring is a simplified analysis wherein the effect of an immediate change to a system is calculated without regard to the longer-term response of the system to that change. If the short-term effect i ...
program released by Eiffel Software, originally produced as a result of a Masters Thesis project at
ETH Zurich (colloquially) , former_name = eidgenössische polytechnische Schule , image = ETHZ.JPG , image_size = , established = , type = Public , budget = CHF 1.896 billion (2021) , rector = Günther Dissertori , president = Joël Mesot , ac ...
. Code analyzer is a Rule-based static code analysis tool which operates both from an embedded mode within EiffelStudio and from
command line A command-line interpreter or command-line processor uses a command-line interface (CLI) to receive commands from a user in the form of lines of text. This provides a means of setting parameters for the environment, invoking executables and pro ...
. It utilizes the
abstract syntax tree In computer science, an abstract syntax tree (AST), or just syntax tree, is a tree representation of the abstract syntactic structure of text (often source code) written in a formal language. Each node of the tree denotes a construct occurring ...
(AST) produced by the Eiffel compiler and then generates a
control-flow graph In computer science, a control-flow graph (CFG) is a representation, using graph notation, of all paths that might be traversed through a program during its execution. The control-flow graph was discovered by Frances E. Allen, who noted that ...
(CFG), which is computed by a module of code in the tool. The CFG and AST are then visited by a number of defined rules. Violations of any rule are reported to the user as Errors, Warnings, or Hints. Each rule violation reports precisely which rule was violated.


See also

*
Eiffel (programming language) Eiffel is an object-oriented programming, object-oriented programming language designed by Bertrand Meyer (an object-orientation proponent and author of ''Object-Oriented Software Construction'') and Eiffel Software. Meyer conceived the language ...
*
List of integrated development environments The following tables list notable software packages that are nominal IDEs; standalone tools such as source code editors and GUI builders are not included. These IDEs are listed in alphabetical order of the supported language. ActionScript ...


References

{{Reflist


Bibliography

* Eiffel Software: EiffelStudio manual. Online a
https://www.eiffel.org/documentation
* Bertrand Meyer: ''Eiffel: The Language'', Prentice Hall, 1991 (second revised printing, 1992). * Bertrand Meyer.: An Object-Oriented Environment: Principles and Applications, Prentice Hall. 1995 (describes the principles underlying the original EiffelBench). * Kim Waldén and Jean-Marc Nerson: ''Seamless Object-Oriented Software Architecture'', Prentice Hall, 1995 (contains a description of the BON method and notation).


External links


Eiffel CommunityFor open-source contributors: Eiffel home page at ETH ZurichEiffel Software's home page at eiffel.comEiffelStudio at SourceForgeEiffelStudio release notes
Object-oriented programming Free integrated development environments Free compilers and interpreters Compilers Integrated development environments Linux integrated development environments Free UML tools