A Web-Based Collaborative Metamodeling Environment with Secure Remote Model Access

This contribution presents GEMSjax - a web-based metamodeling tool for the collaborative development of domain specific languages. By making use of modern Web 2.0 technologies like Ajax and REST services, the tool allows for simultaneous web browser-based creation/ editing of metamodels and model instances, as well as secure remote model access via REST, which enables remote model modification over a simple HTTP-based interface. This paper describes the complex technical challenges we faced and solutions we produced to provide browser-based synchronous model editing. It further explains on the XACML-based access control mechanisms to provide secure remote access to models and model elements. Additionally, we highlight the usefulness of our approach by describing its application in a realistic usage scenario.

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