A catalogue of component connectors to support development with reuse

Component-based development is based on the idea of building software systems by composing pre-existing components. Connectors are the ‘glue’ for composing components. Therefore, it is important to consider connectors as first-class entities and provide adequate descriptions of them to facilitate their understanding and promote their reuse. We have defined a catalogue of component connectors to support the process of ‘development with reuse’. The categories and connector types in the catalogue were obtained through an analysis of the activities involved in this process as well as considering the syntax and semantics of a new component model.