itemis sponsored the Eclipse DemoCamp Stuttgart yesterday. About 60 participants saw impressive demonstrations:

  • Frank Gerhardt started with a demonstration of GEF running in a browser on both PCs and mobile devices. He emphasized the few changes required to GEF code for using it in the browser. Once loaded, all features known from GEF (shape modification, undo/redo, grid, snap to objects, …) run entirely without server interaction. The interaction is adjusted to mobile devices: Click areas are enlarged, and the area below your fingertip is shown in a separate “magnifiying glass” to enable precise modifications.
  • Jochen Krause showed a somewhat opposite approach to mobile apps. RAP mobile provides a unified development environment (including all Eclipse tools magic, debugging and live deployment) for different target platforms. The applications are compiled to native code for each platform. Data processing is server based, with both its advantages and drawbacks: You don’t need to worry about lost data on stolen devices, but you need constant connectivity.
  • Oliver Böhm provided an overview on ten years of PatternTesting. PatternTesting aims at assuring architectural decisions by using aspect-oriented code instrumentation.
  • Mark Brörkens introduced RMF, the Eclipse implementation of OMG ReqIF (Requirements Interchange Format). RMF will become the solid foundation of requirement modeling tools in the Eclipse ecosphere, much the same way Eclipse UML became the de-facto standard implementation.
  • Axel Terfloth demonstrated the remarkable state machine modeling YAKINDU Statechart Tools. They mix the best of graphical and textual modeling and include simulation and debugging capabilities. Additionally, it can attach to domain specific models, shown with a Flash application.
  • Ed Merks solemnized the grand finale with Xcore, an textual syntax for describing ecore models. It supports all ecore features, and then some: Operation implementations inside the model (without quirky annotations), documentation inside ecore models (like Javadoc), live metamodel update inside the reflective editor, and refactoring support down to user-written code.

Before, during and after the demos we had interesting discussions, lots of food and chilled beer.