Meta-modeling of non-functional properties

Modern software systems demand to automatically take care of non-functional properties in all software life-cycle. To respond to this demand, Model Driven Engineering (MDE) contributes to ensure non-functional properties with reduced effort. In this paper, we present a generic, comprehensive and flexible Property Meta-Model (PMM) for defining non-functional properties spanning over dependability, performance and security. PMM also allows for specifying metrics and provides a complex events specification language that takes into account and enhances the composition operators of existing events specification languages. We give examples of using PMM for modeling different properties and in different phases of a MDE process. Furthermore, to evaluate the comprehensiveness and flexibility of PMM with respect to similar approaches, we include results from a systematic survey on MDE approaches dealing with non-functional properties, metrics and complex events.