Foundations of Model (Driven) (Reverse) Engineering : Models -- Episode I: Stories of The Fidus Papyrus and of The Solarus

TLDR: From Ancient Egypt to Model Driven Engineering (MDE) as mentioned in this paper is a series aiming at defining the founda- tions of MDE independently from a particular technology, such as a megamodel.

Abstract: Model Driven Engineering (MDE) received a lot of attention in the last years, both from academia and industry. However, there is still a debate on which basic concepts form the foundation of MDE. The Model Driven Ar- chitecture (MDA) from the OMG does not provided clear answers to this question. This standard instead provides a complex set of interdependen t technologies. This paper is the first of a series aiming at defining the founda- tions of MDE independently from a particular technology. A megamodel is introduced in this paper and incrementally refined in further papers from the series. This paper is devoted to a single concept, the concept of model, and to a single relation, the RepresentationOf relation. The lack of strong founda- tions for the MDA' 4-layers meta-pyramid leads to a common mockery: "So, MDA is just about Egyptology?!". This paper is the pilot of the series called "From Ancient Egypt to Model Driven Engineering". The various episodes of this series show that Egyptology is actually a good model to study MDE.