The architects of the Software Factories method provide
a detailed look at this faster, less expensive, and more reliable approach to application development. Software Factories significantly increase the level of automation in application development at medium to large companies, applying the
time tested pattern of using visual languages to enable rapid assembly and configuration of framework based components.

    Unlike other approaches to Model Driven Development (MDD), such as Model Driven Architecture (MDA) from the Object Management Group (OMG), Software Factories do
not use the Unified Modeling Language (UML), a general purpose modeling language designed for models used as documentation. They go beyond models as documentation, using models based on highly tuned Domain Specific Languages (DSLs) and the Extensible Markup Language (XML) as source artifacts, to capture life cycle metadata, and to support high fidelity model transformation, code generation and other forms of automation.   

Part I: Introduction to Software Factories.
Chapter 1: Introduction.
Chapter 2: Dealing with Complexity.
Chapter 3: Dealing with Change.
Part II: Critical Innovations.
Chapter 6: Models and Patterns.
Chapter 7: Programming with Models.
Chapter 8: Language Anatomy.
Part III: Software Factories in Depth.
Chapter 16: A Software Factory Example.
Chapter 17: Frequently Asked Questions.
Appendix A: Abstraction and Refinement.
Appendix B: The Unified Modeling Language.

JACK GREENFIELD (Redmond, WA) is an Architect for Visual Studio Team System. He is an author, frequent speaker, and key contributor to component, model, and pattern technologies at Microsoft.

KEITH SHORT (Redmond, WA) is an Architect for Visual Studio Team System. He is responsible for strategy and architecture for enterprise tools at Microsoft.

STEVE COOK (Canterbury, UK) is an Architect for Visual Studio Team System. He was formerly an IBM Distinguished Engineer and a major contributor to UML and UML2.

STUART KENT (Bishop’s Stortford, UK) is a Program Manager for Visual Studio Team System. He focuses on modeling technology and is an internationally recognized authority
on UML.