ICSA 2025
Mon 31 March - Fri 4 April 2025 Odense, Denmark
ICSA 2025 (series) /

LArc 2025

1st International Workshop on Low-Code Development and Software Architecture

The emerging paradigm of Low-Code (LC) / No-Code (NC) software development is a promising avenue to counter the currently dire shortage of skilled software developers. The hopes posed in the advent of AI to code instead of humans are currently too high. AI generation is a black box approach that is both difficult to steer with precision, as the specification are mostly in natural language through prompts, and difficult to check thoroughly, as the produced code is too distant from the abilities of the non-programmers who give the prompts. For example, high assurance systems could not be produced this way, as they require certification, nor any software for regulated industries (healthcare, transportation, finances, among others), nor business critical systems, where case by case accountability and explanations are mandatory or prudent.

LC/NC approaches are here of help, as they hinge on some kind of models and some kind of direct “checkability” of those models in order to ensure properties of the resulting artefacts. Because they use models, it is in principle possible to formalize the “language” of various flavours of LC and NC. Because these languages are abstract, very often graphical, and tend to be domain-specific, they resonate well with domains experts who are not able to code and do not intend to become skilled in programming in order to do their (non-programmer) jobs.

A number of researchers and practitioners say that LC/NC is not new, as many communities of research and practice have pushed in this direction for over five decades. Model-driven development, domain-specific languages, 5G languages, formal methods, service-oriented computing, semantic web, process algebras, coordination languages, and many more have certainly contributed to the advancement of the state of the art from different premises and with different target adopters. However, none of them has succeeded. The LC/NC wave we are observing today seems to be steered by new actors coming from the practice, and in many respects reinventing wheels detached from the “culture” and the advances in each of the above domains.

Specifically of interest here is the relationship between LC/NC approaches and software architectures. Software architecture is concerned with the structures and relations and their properties in software systems to enable reasoning about the system and its qualities. The qualities are expressed in quality attribute scenarios and implemented through tactics and patterns. This relationship, however, comes with many questions. If architectures are more “under the hood”, to which extent do they still matter? And to whom do they matter? Will LC/NC development tools impose architectural choices or paradigms? To which extent is the quest for modularization and reusability inherent to the concept of components in component-based development, objects in object-oriented programming, services and microservices, in connection with the LC/NC paradigm?

This workshop intends to thematize the relationship between LC/NC and software architectures, because this is a key point in the connection between the art and engineering of software design as it has been taught and practiced for decades and the new approach, which, according to some enthusiasts, has the potential to become the “next wave” of revolution in the software and IT landscape next to or after AI.

The objectives of the workshop are to:
  • gather researchers and practitioners interested in discussing low-code development and its implications for software architecture;
  • explore how software architecture issues are currently handled by low-code platforms;
  • identify the impact of low-code development to long-term software architecture;
  • discuss the challenges of implementing software architecture tactics and design patterns in low-code development;
  • discuss the impact of low-code development on quality attributes.

Important Dates

  • Paper Submission Deadline: December 20, 2024
  • Notification of Acceptance: January 20, 2025
  • Camera-Ready Submission: January 27, 2025

Topics

The topics of interest to the workshop include:
  • Architectural styles for low-code platforms
  • Consistency between requirements and design in low-code platforms
  • Low-code development platforms “as a service”
  • Microservices for low-code development
  • End-user software engineering and low-code architecture
  • Specification and evaluation of quality aspects (e.g., security, performance, scalability, reliability, maintainability, deployability) in low-code platforms
  • Graphical and textual domain-specific languages for low-code architecture
  • Component-based development in low-code platforms
  • Reuse in low-code development
  • Visualization of software architecture for low-code development
  • Low-code architecture and continuous deployment
  • Low-code development and reference architectures
  • Low-code development and architectural documentation
  • Low-code development and architectural erosion/debt
  • Interoperability issues with low-code platforms
  • Generative AI for low-code architecture
  • Empirical studies on low-code development and software architecture

Submission

We solicit the submission of:
  • Full technical papers (including industry experience papers), which should not exceed 10 pages for the main text, inclusive of all figures, tables, references, appendices, etc.
  • Short position papers (including industry experience papers), which should not exceed 6 pages for the main text, inclusive of all figures, tables, references, appendices, etc.

All contributions should be submitted by the submission deadline using ICSA’s EasyChair (LArc Workshop) online submission site (select the track “1st International Workshop on Low-Code Development and Software Architecture”). Submissions must follow the IEEE conference proceedings format and abide by the single-anonymous submission process (author identities are known). All submissions must be original work and must not have been previously published, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere.

Publication

All accepted papers will be published in the ICSA 2025 Companion Proceedings and appear in the IEEE Xplore Digital Library. At least one author of each accepted paper is required to register for the workshop and attend it in person to present the work.

Track Chairs

  • Thiago Rocha Silva, The Maersk Mc-Kinney Moller Institute, University of Southern Denmark, Denmark
  • Torben Worm, The Maersk Mc-Kinney Moller Institute, University of Southern Denmark, Denmark
  • Tiziana Margaria, R@ISE & Lero, University of Limerick, Ireland

Program Committee

  • Cristina Seceleanu, Mälardalen University, Sweden
  • Davide Di Ruscio, Università degli Studi dell'Aquila, Italy
  • Rosemary Monahan, Maynooth University, Ireland
  • Stefan Sauer, Paderborn University, Germany
  • Michel Chaudron, Eindhoven University of Technology, The Netherlands
  • Fitash Ul Haq, Luxembourg Institute of Science and Technology, Luxembourg
  • Jácome Cunha, University of Porto, Portugal
  • Juan de Lara, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, Spain
  • Bernhard Steffen, TU Dortmund, Germany
  • Tingting Bi, University of Western Australia, Australia
  • Nelly Bencomo, Durham University, UK
  • Yvonne Dittrich, IT University of Copenhagen, Denmark
  • Esther Guerra, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, Spain
  • Erlend Stav, SINTEF ICT, Norway
  • Mike Hinchey, University of Limerick, Ireland