Programming Process Coordination in Little-JIL
Barbara Staudt Lerner, Leon J. Osterweil,
Stanley M. Sutton Jr., and Alexander Wise
Computer Science Department
University of Massachusetts
Amherst, Massachusetts 01003
{lerner, ljo, sutton, sandy}@cs.umass.edu
http://laser.cs.mass.edu
Abstract
Process programming languages have not been readily adopted by
practitioners. We are addressing this problem through the development
of Little-JIL, a language that focuses on the coordination aspects of
processes and provides a visual representation, yet one that is
rigorous enough for execution and formal reasoning. We have used
Little-JIL to program
several software engineering processes, knowledge discovery processes,
and are working on processes to coordinate robot teams. We believe
the simplicity gained by focusing on coordination and visualization
should make Little-JIL both readily adoptable and
widely useful.