JP2000047859A - Automatic program generator and mechanically readable recording medium recorded with program - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To allow a user to describe a specification by an optimal specification form which is decided by a device itself for every function of a program to be automatically generated by the user based on specification description generated by the user. SOLUTION: Correspondence between a function and a specification form is set beforehand in a function/specification form correspondence table 110 by considering that the optimal specification form is fixed to some extent for each function, etc. When the user designates some functions as necessary functions of the program to be automatically generated by the user, a specification form deciding means 101 decides a specification form for describing the specification of each function by referring to the table by each function designed by the user. In order to allow the user to describe a specification, an editor control means 100 automatically starts an editor corresponding to the decided specification form in plural editors 102-1 to 102-n.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an apparatus for automatically generating a program according to a specification description created by a user.
More specifically, the program itself automatically determines the optimum specification format for each function of the program that the user intends to automatically generate, and causes the user to describe the specification in the determined specification format. Related to the device.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art An automatic program generation apparatus is an apparatus for automatically generating a program satisfying a user's requirement described from a specification description which is easy for a user (human) to understand. Various devices have been researched and developed, such as a device for automatically generating a program from a specification description and a device for automatically generating a program from a specification description in a block diagram format. However, in the case of a program having a plurality of functions, it is difficult to describe the specifications of the entire program in a single format. For this reason, an automatic program generation device capable of handling various types of specification descriptions is desired.

[0003] As a conventional technology satisfying such demands,
There is an automatic program generation method described in JP-A-2-236720. This conventional technology includes various automatically generated components such as an automatically generated component that generates a program from a specification description in a flowchart format and an automatically generated component that generates a program from a specification description in a block diagram format. The apparatus itself selects an optimal automatically generated component for each function of the program. And
For the selected automatically generated component, the user inputs a specification and attempts to generate a program (module). If the selected automatically generated component fails to generate a program from the specification, Select another auto-generated part and try program generation again. The final program is obtained by combining the modules generated by the respective automatically generated components in accordance with the respective specifications.

[0004]

In the above-mentioned prior art, when a specification is input to a certain automatically generated part selected for a certain function of a program to be automatically generated and activated, the program (module If the generation of ()) fails, another automatically generated part is selected and the program generation is retried to ensure that the program can be generated regardless of the specifications. Therefore, there is no need for the user to forcibly input a specification in a format suitable for the system.

[0005] However, in the case where the format of the specification to be input is left to the user, the following problem arises. (A) In general, an appropriate specification format is determined to some extent for each function of a program. For this reason, there is no problem for users who are familiar with the appropriate specification format for each function, but it is difficult for users with little knowledge to write specifications in the appropriate specification format from the beginning. is there. (B) When managing an automatically generated program, the specification description is also managed. However, even if the program has the same function, if the specification format differs for each user, the management becomes complicated. , Not enough management.

The present invention has been proposed in view of such conventional problems, and has as its object to determine the optimum specification format for each function of a program which a user intends to automatically generate. It is another object of the present invention to provide an automatic program generation device that allows a user to describe a specification in the determined specification format.

[0007]

According to the present invention, there are provided a plurality of automatically generated parts for automatically generating individual codes for realizing a predetermined function from a specification description in a predetermined format, and a specification description for each function created by a user. An automatic program generation device that generates an individual code for each function from the automatic generation component corresponding to the function, and generates a program by combining the generated individual code for each function. A function / specification format correspondence table that sets the correspondence between
A specification format determining unit that refers to the function / specification format correspondence table for each function specified by a user as a function to be possessed by the program to be automatically generated and determines a specification format for describing the specification of the function; For each function specified by the user as a function that the program to be generated should have,
Editor control means for allowing the user to describe the specification in the specification format determined by the specification format determination means.

In a preferred embodiment of the present invention, an editor for each specification format is provided, and the editor control means automatically starts an editor corresponding to the specification format determined by the specification format determination means. Have. Of course, a message may be presented to the user prompting the user to start the editor corresponding to the specification format determined by the specification format determining means, and the user himself may start the editor.

In the automatic program generating apparatus of the present invention configured as described above, the optimum specification format for each function is determined to some extent, and this function is unified in-house by unifying this specification format. The correspondence between functions and specification formats is set in advance in the function / specification format correspondence table based on the program management policy, etc. Is specified, the specification format determination means refers to the correspondence table for each function specified by the user and determines a specification format in which the specification of each function is described. Then, the editor control means automatically activates, for example, an editor corresponding to the specification format determined by the specification format determination means so that the user describes the specification in the specification format determined by the specification format determination means.

[0010]

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS Next, embodiments of the present invention will be described in detail with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing an example of a program automatic generation device according to the present invention. The automatic program generation device of this example includes a processing device 1, a display device 2, an input device 3, and an auxiliary storage device 4 connected to the processing device 1.

The display device 2 comprises, for example, a CRT display device, and the input device 3 comprises, for example, a keyboard and a mouse. The user uses the display device 2 and the input device 3 to create a list of functions to be possessed by the program to be automatically generated, to create function-related information indicating a method of combining the functions, Describe the specifications for each function.

The auxiliary storage device 4 is a device for storing an automatically generated program (source code) 41.

The processing device 1 is a device for automatically generating a program in accordance with the specification description created by the user using the display device 2 and the input device 3 and outputting the program to the auxiliary storage device 4. In the case of this embodiment, the editor control means 100, specification format determining means 101, various editors 102-1 to 10-2
2-n, including automatically generated component selection means 103, individual code generation means 104, individual code combination means 105, and a function / specification format correspondence table 110, function list information 111, function related information 112, each function Specifications 1
13-1 to 113-m, automatic generation component 114 for each function
-1 to 114-x, individual code 115-1 to each function
Storage units M0 and M for storing 115-m, respectively.
1, M2, M3-1 to M3-m, M4, M5-1 to M5
-M.

The editors 102-1 to 102-n are different types of editors, one of which is a table creation editor, and the other is a state transition diagram creation editor, which is owned by the user of the program. It is used when creating function list information or creating function-related information. In addition, various editors such as a flowchart creation editor, a screen layout creation editor, a form layout creation editor, and a block diagram creation editor are prepared, and specifications can be described in an arbitrary specification format.

The storage unit M1 is a file holding the function list information 111 created by the user, and the storage unit M2 is a file holding the function related information 112 created by the user.

The storage unit M0 stores a function / specification format correspondence table 11
For example, a file holding 0. FIG. 2 shows an example of the contents of the function / specification format correspondence table 110. In this example, a flowchart, a screen layout diagram, a form layout, and the like are provided as specification formats in which specification descriptions of the functions such as a search function, a display function, and a printing function are to be created in correspondence with the names (function names) of the functions. A specification format such as a figure is set. The function / specification format correspondence table 110 is determined in advance based on the fact that the optimal specification format for each function has been determined to some extent, and the in-house program management policy such as unifying this function with this specification format. Have been. In addition, the layout diagram is the screen / form,
Where (which coordinates) and which element (title, display text, GUI button, etc.) is arranged is represented by an image diagram.

The specification format determining means 101 refers to a function / specification format correspondence table 110 when the editor name is notified from the editor control means 100, and determines a specification format for describing the specification of the function. is there. The determined specification format is notified to the editor control means 100.

The editor control means 100 is a means for activating the various editors 102-1 to 102n and storing data created by the activated editor. The editor control means 100 according to the present embodiment has a function of activating an editor specified by a user through the input device 3 and, at the time of creating a specification description for each function after creating the function list information 111 by the user. , Specification format determination means 1
It has a function of automatically starting the editor of the specification format determined in step 01.

The storage units M3-1 to M3-m store specification descriptions 113-for each function created by a user using an editor.
For example, a file that holds 1-113-m.

The storage unit M4 stores a plurality of automatically generated components 114
-1 to 114-x.
The storage unit M4 includes an automatically generated component that generates an individual code that realizes a search function from a specification description in a flowchart format, an automatically generated component that generates an individual code that realizes a display function from a specification description in a screen layout diagram format, and a form. Various automatically generated components, such as an automatically generated component that realizes an individual code that realizes a printing function from a specification description in a layout diagram format, are stored in advance so as to be searchable by function name.

The automatically generated component selection means 103 is a means for searching the storage unit M4 with the function name notified from the individual code generation means 104 and returning the corresponding automatically generated component to the individual code generation means 104.

The individual code generation means 104 stores in the storage units M3-1 to M3-1 for each function name described in the function list information 111.
In addition to acquiring the specification description of the same function stored in M3-m, the function name is notified to the automatically generated component selection unit 103 to obtain the corresponding automatically generated component, and the automatically generated component is described in the specification description. This is a means for generating individual codes 115-1 to 115-m that realize the function by being activated below.

The storage units M5-1 to M5-m are files or the like which hold the individual codes for each function generated by the individual code generation unit 104.

The individual code combining means 105 includes a storage unit M5
-1 to M5-m, the individual codes for each function are input, and the individual codes are combined according to the function-related information 112 created by the user and held in the storage unit M2, so that the final source This is a means for generating the code 41.

The processing device 1 can be realized by a personal computer, a workstation, or the like. In that case, as shown in FIG. 1, a CD-ROM,
A machine-readable recording medium MEM such as a semiconductor memory or a magnetic disk device is connected to the processing device 1. The recording medium MEM stores a program for an automatic program generation device, which is read by a CPU constituting the processing device 1 when the processing device 1 is started up, and is stored in a memory on a memory constituting the processing device 1. M0, M1, M2, M
3-1 to M3-m, M4, M5-1 to M5-m are loaded, and by controlling the operation of the CPU, the editor control means 100, the specification format determination means 101, Editors 102-1 to 102-n,
Automatic generation component selection means 103, individual code generation means 10
4. A functional unit such as the individual code combining unit 105 is realized.

Next, the operation of the automatic program generation device of the present embodiment configured as described above will be described.

When a program having several functions is created by using the automatic program generation apparatus of the present embodiment, the user needs to obtain a list of functions of the program and a function relation indicating a method of combining the functions. Create information and. FIG. 3 shows a processing procedure at this time.

First, the user designates the table creation editor as the type of editor from the input device 3 and instructs start-up. The editor control means 100 selects and activates the table creation editor from among the plurality of editors 102-1 to 102-n according to the command. As a result, the screen of the table creation editor is displayed on the screen of the display device 2, and the user creates the function list information by sequentially inputting the names of the functions of the program from the input device 3. (Step 3-1 in FIG. 3). FIG. 4 shows an example of the created function list information. In this example, the user designates three functions of a search function, a display function, and a print function.

Next, the user designates the state transition diagram editor as the type of editor from the input device 3 and instructs start-up. The editor control means 100 selects and activates the state transition diagram editor from the plurality of editors 102-1 to 102-n in accordance with this command. As a result, the screen of the state transition diagram editor is displayed on the screen of the display device 2, and the user defines an event and a state for representing a condition for activating each function (step 3 in FIG. 3). 2) Then, the defined state is associated with the function corresponding to the event in the form of a state transition table (step 3-3 in FIG. 3). FIG. 5 shows an example of this state transition table. In this example, for example, only the search function can be started in the initial state, and if a search event occurs, the search function is started and the state advances to the searched state as the next state.

Thereafter, the user checks the consistency, and if necessary, corrects the state transition table and, if necessary, the function list information (step 3-4 in FIG. 3). If there is no problem, registration is instructed from the input device 3. Thereby, the editor control means 100 stores the created function list information as the function list information 111 in the storage unit M1, and stores the created state transition table as the function related information 112 in the storage unit M2.

When the user creates function list information and a state transition table and stores them, the editor control means 100 starts control for allowing the user to input a specification description of each function. FIG. 6 shows the flow of processing of the editor control means 100 at that time.

First, the editor control means 100 extracts a function name for which a specification description has not been created from the function list information 111 (step 6-1 in FIG. 6). Next, the extracted function name is passed to the specification format determining means 101 to obtain a specification format to be returned (step 6-3). Here, the specification format determining means 101
Is the function name passed from the editor control means 100 in FIG.
Search the function / specification format correspondence table 110 as shown in
The specification format corresponding to the function name is set in the editor control means 10.
Return to 0. The editor control means 100 selects and starts an editor of the specification format determined by the specification format determination means 101 from the plurality of editors 102-1 to 102-n (step 6-4). Thereby, the screen of the editor is displayed on the display device 2. At this time, the editor control means 100 displays the current function name in a corner of the screen of the display device 2 or the like, and instructs the user to describe the specification of the function using the editor started this time. The user creates a specification description of the function by inputting various data from the input device 3 to the editor screen displayed on the screen. When the user has created the specification description,
When the save command is issued, the editor control means 100 attaches the current function name to the specification description created by the editor and stores it in any of the storage units M3-1 to M3-m (step 6-5). Then, the process returns to step 6-1 to perform the same processing for the next function name in the function list information 111. When the processing has been completed for all the function names in the function list information 111 (YES in step 6-2), the editor control means 100 ends the processing. At this point, the specification description for each function is stored in the storage units M3-1 to M3-m. Thereafter, the control moves to the individual code generation means 104.

The individual code generation means 104 includes a storage unit M3
Individual codes for each function are generated using the specification descriptions stored in -1 to M3-m and the automatically generated components 114-1 to 114-x stored in the storage unit M4. FIG. 7 shows the flow of processing of the individual code generation means 104 at that time.

First, the individual code generation means 104 extracts a function name for which an individual code has not been generated from the function list information 111 (step 7-1 in FIG. 7). Next, the extracted function name is passed to the automatically generated component selection means 103 to obtain a returned automatically generated component (step 7-3). Here, the automatically generated component selection unit 103 searches the storage unit M4 with the function name passed from the individual code generation unit 104, and returns the automatically generated component corresponding to the function name to the individual code generation unit 104. Also, the individual code generation means 104 performs step 7-
The specification description with the function name extracted in step 1 is stored in the storage unit M3-
1 to M3-m (step 7-4). Then, the individual code generation unit 104 inputs the specification description to the automatically generated component and starts up (Step 7-5).
Thereby, an individual code corresponding to the function is generated. Next, the individual code generation unit 104 assigns a function name to the generated individual code and stores it in any of the storage units M5-1 to M5-m (step 7-6). Then, the process returns to step 7-1 to perform the same processing for the next function name in the function list information 111. When the processing is completed for all the function names in the function list information 111 (YE in step 7-2)
S), the individual code generation means 104 ends the processing. At this point, the individual codes for each function are stored in the storage units M5-1 to M5.
−m. Thereafter, control is transferred to the individual code combining means 105.

The individual code combining means 105 includes a storage unit M5
-1 to M5-m by combining the individual codes stored therein,
It is output to the auxiliary storage device 4 as a source code 41. FIG. 8 shows the flow of processing of the individual code combining means 105 at that time.

The individual code combining means 105 analyzes the function-related information 112 in the form of a state transition table as shown in FIG. 5, and generates a combined part (step 8-1). The connection portion is realized as a code for calling an individual code corresponding to each function, for example, as a branch process corresponding to the state transition in FIG. Next, the individual code combining means 105
The final source code is generated by combining the combined portion with the individual code (step 8-2).

In the above embodiment, the editor control means 1
00, the editor corresponding to the specification format determined by the specification format determining means 101 is automatically started. However, the editor control means 100 starts the editor corresponding to the specification format determined by the specification format determining means 101. The prompting message may be displayed on the screen of the display device 2 and presented to the user, and the user may activate the editor.

[0039]

According to the automatic program generation device of the present invention described above, the following effects can be obtained.

Even a user who does not know an appropriate specification format for each function can describe the specification in an appropriate specification format from the beginning. The reason is that the device itself determines the optimum specification format for each function of the program that the user intends to automatically generate, and causes the user to describe the specification in the determined specification format.

When the automatically generated program is managed together with its specification description, the management becomes easy. The reason is,
This is because when a plurality of automatically generated programs include the same function, the format of the specification description of the function is unified regardless of the creator.

In a configuration in which an editor for each specification format is provided and the editor control means automatically starts the editor corresponding to the specification format determined by the specification format determination means, the burden on the user can be reduced and It is possible to prevent a mistake in describing a specification in an incorrect specification format.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram illustrating an example of an automatic program generation device according to the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a diagram showing an example of the contents of a function / specification format correspondence table.

FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing a processing procedure when a user creates function list information and function related information.

FIG. 4 is a diagram showing an example of created function list information.

FIG. 5 is a diagram illustrating an example of a created state transition table (function-related information).

FIG. 6 is a flowchart showing a processing example of an editor control means.

FIG. 7 is a flowchart illustrating a processing example of an individual code generation unit.

FIG. 8 is a flowchart showing a processing example of an individual code combining unit.

[Explanation of symbols]

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 ... Processing apparatus 1 2 ... Display apparatus 3 ... Input apparatus 4 ... Auxiliary storage apparatus 100 ... Editor control means 101 ... Specification format determination means 102-1 to 102-n ... Editor 103 ... Automatic generation component selection means 104 ... Individual code generation Means 105: Individual code combining means 110: Function / specification form correspondence table 111: Function list information 112: Function related information 113-1 to 113-m: Specification description for each function 114-1 to 114-x: For each function Automatically generated parts 115-1 to 115-m... Individual codes for each function M0, M1, M2, M3-1 to M3-m, M4, M5-
1 to M5-m ... storage unit

Claims (4)

[Claims] 1. A plurality of automatically generated parts for automatically generating individual codes for realizing a predetermined function from a specification description in a predetermined format, wherein a specification description for each function created by a user and the automatic generation corresponding to the function are provided. In a program automatic generation device that generates an individual code for each function from a component and combines the generated individual code for each function to generate a program, the correspondence between the function and the specification format is set. Refers to the function / specification format correspondence table and the function / specification format correspondence table for each function specified by the user as the function that the program to be automatically generated should have, and determines the specification format that describes the specifications of that function Specification format determining means to perform, and a specification format determined by the specification format determining means for each function specified by a user as a function to be possessed by a program to be automatically generated. And an editor control means for allowing a user to describe specifications in the automatic program generation device. 2. An editor for each specification format, wherein said editor control means automatically starts an editor corresponding to the specification format determined by said specification format determination means. 2. The program automatic generation device according to 1. 3. An editor for each specification format, wherein the editor control means is configured to present to the user a message prompting the user to start an editor corresponding to the specification format determined by the specification format determination means. The automatic program generation device according to claim 1, wherein: 4. A plurality of automatically generated components for automatically generating an individual code for realizing a predetermined function from a specification description in a predetermined format, wherein the specification description for each function created by a user and the automatic generation corresponding to the function are provided. Generates an individual code for each function from the parts and combines the generated individual code for each function with a computer that constitutes an automatic program generation device that generates a program. A storage unit that holds the set function / specification format correspondence table, refers to the function / specification format correspondence table for each function specified by the user as a function that the program to be automatically generated should have, and A specification format determining means for determining a specification format for describing the specification, the specification format for each function specified by a user as a function to be possessed by a program to be automatically generated; An editor control means for allowing a user to describe a specification in a specification format determined by the determination means;