A data exchange format provides a formal notation for the linear description of data to be exchanged between tools.

See the ExchangeFormatBibliography for an overview of exchange formats.


Exchange formats are currently attracting much attention in the reverse and reengineering communities. Parti

At a DagstuhlSeminar in January 2001 on interoperability the GraphExchangeLanguage (GXL) was discussed extensively. Since GXL is more like a meta-language, specific schemas are needed to achieve data exchange between specific analyzers for Cobol, C, etc. During the DagstuhlSeminar further work on three levels was initiated, covering

  1. The SoftwareArchitecture level
  2. An intermediate level covering data and control flow
  3. The abstract syntax tree level

SanderTichelaar has set up a separate Wiki (actually, a rather cool Swiki) devoted to Exchange at http://titan.cnds.unibe.ch:8080/Exchange. It covers someuseful resources as well as updates on the intermediate level.


The report of the January 2001 Dagstuhl seminar on Interoperability of Reengineering Tools is available at
CategoryReengineeringPages | CategoryDataFormat | Contributions by ArieVanDeursen, EelcoVisser

Revision: r1.6 - 02 Mar 2002 - 13:50 - ArieVanDeursen
Transform > ExchangeFormat
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