Designing Interaction Standards

Interface

Abstraction of the behavior of a component.

Includes:

• Interactions of the Component

• Set of Constraints when these interactions occur

Hardware component Interactions

In Example 1, the only interactions were through metal contacts.

• Simple interactions, Simple connectors.

Software component Interactions

• More complex interactions

• Components must follow the interaction standard specified by the component model.

Interaction Standard

• Describes elements that may belong to the Component Interface.

An Interface definition can include

• Resource use (allocated memory, disk usage)

• Processor use (CPU time, number of Operating system threads or processes)

• Database use (database tables or specific embedded queries)

• Global variables (used or defined by the component)

• Methods (parameters, return types, exceptions that may occur)

• I/O specifications (from terminal, disk, network or any device controlled by the Operating System)

• Data type or classes to be provided for the component to execute

Real-time or resource constrained systems

• Explicitly declare more Component Interface information
  
  - Embedded software
  
  - Hand-held devices