Using refactoring techniques for visual editing of hybrid languages

Abstract

In this paper we describe how techniques for refactoring can be used for visual editing of hybrid languages, that is, languages that have both a visual and a textual syntax. Textual languages have name rules that define how name uses are bound to name declarations. These bindings often correspond to connections in the visual language, and need to be taken into account in order to implement the visual edit operations correctly. We use inverse lookup functions, originally devised for renaming, for implementing visual editing operations for hybrid languages.