Building BESSER: an open-source low-code platform


Iván Alfonso, Aaron Conrardy, Armen Sulejmani, Atefeh Nirumand, Fitash Ul Haq, Marcos Gomez-Vazquez, Jean-Sébastien Sottet and Jordi Cabot
[pdf]

Enterprise, Business-Process and Information Systems Modeling, 203-212
EMMSAD 2024 Conference.
Limassol, Cyprus
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-61007-3_16

Abstract

Low-code platforms (latest reincarnation of the long tradition of model-driven engineering approaches) have the potential of saving us countless hours of repetitive boilerplate coding tasks. However, as software systems grow in complexity, low-code platforms need to adapt as well. Notably, nowadays this implies adapting to the modeling and generation of smart software. At the same time, if we want to broaden the userbase of this type of tools, we should also be able to provide more open source alternatives that help potential users avoid vendor lock-ins and give them the freedom to explore low-code development approaches (even adapting the tool to better fit their needs). To fulfil these needs, we are building BESSER, an open source low-code platform for developing (smart) software. BESSER offers various forms (i.e., notations) for system and domain specification (e.g. UML for technical users and chatbots for business users) together with a number of generators. Both types of components can be extended and are open to contributions from the community.

Keywords

low-code, AI, Model-driven, DSL, code generation

Cite this paper


@InProceedings{10.1007/978-3-031-61007-3_16,
    author="Alfonso, Iv{\'a}n
    and Conrardy, Aaron
    and Sulejmani, Armen
    and Nirumand, Atefeh
    and Ul Haq, Fitash
    and Gomez-Vazquez, Marcos
    and Sottet, Jean-S{\'e}bastien
    and Cabot, Jordi",
    editor="van der Aa, Han
    and Bork, Dominik
    and Schmidt, Rainer
    and Sturm, Arnon",
    title="Building BESSER: An Open-Source Low-Code Platform",
    booktitle="Enterprise, Business-Process and Information Systems Modeling",
    year="2024",
    publisher="Springer Nature Switzerland",
    address="Cham",
    pages="203--212",
    abstract="Low-code platforms (latest reincarnation of the long tradition of model-driven engineering approaches) have the potential of saving us countless hours of repetitive boilerplate coding tasks. However, as software systems grow in complexity, low-code platforms need to adapt as well. Notably, nowadays this implies adapting to the modeling and generation of smart software. At the same time, if we want to broaden the userbase of this type of tools, we should also be able to provide more open source alternatives that help potential users avoid vendor lock-ins and give them the freedom to explore low-code development approaches (even adapting the tool to better fit their needs). To fulfil these needs, we are building BESSER, an open source low-code platform for developing (smart) software. BESSER offers various forms (i.e., notations) for system and domain specification (e.g. UML for technical users and chatbots for business users) together with a number of generators. Both types of components can be extended and are open to contributions from the community.",
    isbn="978-3-031-61007-3"
}