The Adobe application modeling technology brings model-driven development to Adobe LiveCycle® software developers. The technology enables developers to write applications at a higher level, reducing the amount of code and simplifying data integration in the development of applications.
Adobe application modeling technology is similar to other data modeling languages in that it supports a mechanism to define data entities and relationships. However, this capability is not adequate when it comes to building today's data-centric applications. Adobe application modeling technology fills the gap by adding support for services and data behaviors. Specifically, the model becomes a representation of the application, instead of a representation of your data. This enables the various components of your application to share data and business logic.
Adobe application modeling technology consists of:
- A modeling language, which enables you to define data entities, services, and behaviors
- Graphical and text-based tools, which enable the visual and source manipulation and use of models
- Flexible, template-based Code Generators, which generate ActionScript® and Java™ code from a model available both in LiveCycle and Adobe Flash® Builder™ 4.6 software
- An SDK to allow developers to extend modeling language capabilities
- A runtime that understands the model and provides functionality associated with model behaviors
With Adobe application modeling technology, developers start by creating an application model. They can then use that model to go on and develop the user interface and server business logic.
As an example, the LiveCycle Workbench ES3 module supports the creation of models from web services and provides the ability to create rich Internet applications (RIAs) based on the model. A graphical modeling editor can be installed as a plug-in to Flash Builder 4.6 to automatically generate both client and server code, simplifying and accelerating the application development lifecycle. LiveCycle Data Services ES3 includes the model runtime that enables additional functionality out of the box, such as dynamic configuration, automatic persistence support, and validation of all incoming and outgoing data. The latest LiveCycle Data Services release provides additional client SDKs for HTML/JavaScript, native iOS and Java/Google Android to leverage applications models on different client technologies.
