Current State

Assistant Professor at the Faculty of Sciences of Gabes, Tunisia.

Member of the Laboratory on Development and Control of Distributed Applications (ReDCAD).

Education

PhD thesis in Computer Science from the University of Sfax (Faculty of Economics Sciences and Management of Sfax), in 2016.

Master degree in Computer Science from the Faculty of Economics Sciences and Management of Sfax-Tunisia in 2010.

Gratuated in computer science from the Faculty of Economics Sciences and Management of Sfax-Tunisia in 2007.

Baccalaureate in Mathematics in Gafsa-Tunisia, in 2003.

Research activities

Research Topics

My research activities focus on:

  • Service Oriented Architectures
  • SOA Design Patterns
  • Software Modeling
  • Formal Design
  • Component-based Architectures
  • Software Architectures Adaptation
  • Eclipse for Modeling

Thesis

Title: ReMoCo-SDP : A Refinement-Based Approach for modeling and composing SOA Design Patterns
Abstract: Design Patterns provide architects and developers with reusable software elements that play a key role in building complex software systems. Nevertheless, presented in an informal way, these patterns may give rise to ambiguities and may lead to their incorrect usage. We focus in this thesis on SOA design patterns and propose alternatives to their visual and informal description. The contributions of this thesis consist in proposing ReMoCo-SDP: a refinement based approach for modeling and composition SOA design patterns. Specifically, this approach is organized around three major axes. The first axis consists in providing modeling solutions in conformance with the SoaML standard language. It mainly consists in providing a design approach for developing SOA design patterns models using a standard notation. The second axis includes the automatic transformation of pattern models to Event-B formal specifications and the verification of the design correctness using the Rodin platform. Our objective is to design patterns proven correct by construction to overcome the problems of their proprietary and informal notations in order to successfully apply these patterns and promote their reuse. Finally, as in real applications design patterns are often composed, the correct application of these patterns is therefore based on a precise definition of these compositions. The third axis consists then in proposing a rigorous method for pattern composition based on two steps. The first step consists in proposing a precise definition of the composition process with the semi-formal SoaML language. The second step consists in proposing a process of formal composition using the Event-B method. Our approach covers both structural and behavioral features of the patterns. To help non-specialists understanding the proposed approach, we illustrate it in more detail through various case studies.
The proposed ReMoCo-SDP approach was subject of an implementation, a tool integrated as a plug-in in the Eclipse platform. More details about the tool are available in its website at URL : www.redcad.org/projects/ReMo-SDP/.

Keywords : SOA Design patterns, SoaML modeling, Event-B formal specification, Pattern transformation.

Supervisors: Dr. Mohamed Hadj Kacem, Prof. Ahmed Hadj Kacem and Prof. Khalil Drira.

Supervision of research

Co-supervision of several masters degrees in Computer Science:

Mohamed Lemine Mohamed Yehdhih, Transformation and Implementation of Compound SOA Design Patterns, defended on January 28, 2017, at Faculty of Economics Sciences and Management of Sfax

Hayfa Ben Abdallah, Design and implementation of an Eclipse plug-in for modeling SOA design patterns, defended on December 15, 2012, at Faculty of Economics Sciences and Management of Sfax

Zied Hrichi, Transforming message-oriented SOA design patterns to Event-B specifications, defended on September, 2013, at Higher Institute of Computer Science and Multimedia of Sfax

Publications

Papers in International Scientific Journals

[J1]

Imen Tounsi, Mohamed Hadj Kacem, Ahmed Hadj Kacem and Khalil Drira. A Refinement-Based Approach for Building Valid SOA Design Patterns. In: International Journal of Cloud Computing, IJCC 4(1):78–104, (2015).

Papers in International Conferences

[C11]

Ilhem Khlif, Imen Tounsi, Mohamed Hadj Kacem, Eicheler,C. and Ahmed Hadj Kacem. A refinement-based approach for specifying multi-scale software architectures, The 33rd ACM/SIGAPP Symposium on Applied Computing, (SAC’2018). ACM, 9 - 13 April, Pau, France (2018) (to appear).

[C10]

Imen Tounsi, Mohamed Hadj Kacem, Ahmed Hadj Kacem and Khalil Drira. Transformation of compound SOA Design Patterns, Procedia Computer Science, 109 : pp. 408-415, 2017. 8th International Conference on Ambient Systems Networks and Technologies (ANT’2017), and the 7th International Conference on Sustainable Energy Information Technology (SEIT’2017), ELSEVIER 16-19 May 2017, Madeira, Portugal (2017).

[C9]

Imen Tounsi, Mohamed Hadj Kacem, Ahmed Hadj Kacem and Khalil Drira. A formal approach for SOA Design Patterns Composition, The 12th ACS/IEEE International Conference on Computer Systems and Applications, (AICCSA’2015), IEEE Computer Society, Marrakech, Maroc (2015).

[C8]

Imen Tounsi, Mohamed Hadj Kacem, Ahmed Hadj Kacem and Khalil Drira. A Rule-Based Approach for SOA Design Patterns Composition, The 8th IEEE International Conference on Service Oriented Computing & Applications, (SOCA’2015), page 219-226, IEEE Computer Society, Rome, Italy (2015).

[C7]

Imen Tounsi, Mohamed Hadj Kacem, Zied Hrichi, Ahmed Hadj Kacem and Khalil Drira. ReMo-SDP Tool cookbook, The 2nd International Collaborative Tutorial of Multimedia Ontology-driven Learning Collaborative Architecture, (MOLCA’2014), Toulouse, France (2014).

[C6]

Imen Tounsi, Mohamed Hadj Kacem and Ahmed Hadj Kacem. Building Correct by Construction SOA Design Patterns: Modeling and Refinement. In : Proceedings of the 7th European Conference on Software Architecture, (ECSA’2013), Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol. 7957, pp. 33-44. Springer Berlin Heidelberg, Monpellier, France (2013). [BibteX | DOI]

[C5]

Imen Tounsi, Zied Hrichi, Mohamed Hadj Kacem, Ahmed Hadj Kacem and Khalil Drira. Using SoaML Models and Event-B Specifications for Modeling SOA Design Patterns. In : Proceedings of the 15th International Conference on Enterprise Information Systems (ICEIS’2013), pp. 294-301. Angers, France (2013). [BibteX | DOI]

[C4]

Imen Tounsi, Mohamed Hadj Kacem, Ahmed Hadj Kacem. An Approach for Modeling and Formalizing SOA Design Patterns. In : Proceedings of the IEEE 22nd International WETICE Conference (WETICE’2013), pp. 330-335. IEEE Computer Society, Hammamet, Tunisia (2013). [BibteX | DOI]

[C3]

Imen Tounsi, Mohamed Hadj Kacem, Ahmed Hadj Kacem, and Khalil Drira. The Sender Released Pattern : An SOA design pattern for inter-service message exchange. In : Proceedings of the IEEE 21st International WETICE Conference (WETICE’2012), pp. 405-410. IEEE Computer Society, Toulouse, France (2012). [BibteX | DOI]

[C2]

Imen Loulou, Imen Tounsi, Mohamed Hadj Kacem, Ahmed Hadj Kacem, and Mohamed Jmaiel. Making Sound Policies for Self-healing Systems. In : Proceedings of the 9th annual international conference on New Technologies of Distributed Systems (NOTERE’2009), pp. 178-185, Montreal, Canada (2009). [BibteX | PDF]

[C1]

Imen Loulou, Imen Tounsi, Mohamed Hadj Kacem, Ahmed Hadj Kacem, and Mohamed Jmaiel. A formal architecture-centric approach for safe self-repair. In : Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference on Web and Information Technologies (ICWIT’2009), Sfax, Tunisia (2009). [BibteX | PDF]

Poster Papers

[P2]

Imen Tounsi, Mohamed Hadj Kacem, Ahmed Hadj Kacem, Khalil Drira and Emna Mezghani. Towards an Approach for Modeling and Formalizing SOA Design Patterns with Event-B. In : Proceedings of the 28th Annual ACM Symposium on Applied Computing, (SAC’2013), pp. 1937-1938. ACM, Coimbra, Portugal (2013). [BibteX | DOI]

[P1]

Imen Tounsi, Mohamed Hadj Kacem, Ahmed Hadj Kacem, and Khalil Drira. Poster: An Approach for Modeling and Refinement of SOA Design Patterns with Event-B Method, The 9th workshop on Methods for the Adaptive Distributed Software (METHODICA-II'2012), Hammamet, Tunisia, December 22-24 2012.

Tools & Results

MeidyaCOM-Policy

Abstract : MeidyaCoM-Policy is an extension of MeidyaCoM project. MeidyaCoM project supports the modeling of correct by design Publish/Subscribe architectural style and the basic reconfiguration operations for the adaptation of software architecture. MeidyaCoM-Policy is an approach which proposes a way of applying these operations with respect to architectural style by the means of repair policies.

For more details, you can visit the

MeidyaCom-Policy Web Site.

Contributors: Msc. Imen Tounsi, Dr. Mohamed Hadj Kacem, Dr. Imen Loulou, Prof. Ahmed Hadj Kacem

ReMo-SDP Tool

Abstract: ReMoCo-SDP tool is a graphical modeling tool that implements our approach, it ensures an easy and efficient modeling way for users. It provides the following functionalities:
1. Modeling SOA design patterns with the SoaML language.
2. Transforming SOA design pattern models to Event-B specifications.
3. Composition of SOA design pattern and their transformation to Event-B specifications.

For more details, you can visit the ReMoCo-SDP Tool Web Site.

Contributors: Dr. Imen Tounsi, Msc. Hayfa Ben abdallah, Mr. Zied Hrichi, Mr. Mohamed Lemine Mohamed Yehdhih, Dr. Mohamed Hadj Kacem

Organisation Commitee participation

  • METHODICA'2017: The 14th workshop on Methods for the Adaptive Distributed Software, Monastir, Tunisia, January 13-15 2017.
  • METHODICA-II'2015: The 13th workshop on Methods for the Adaptive Distributed Software, Hammamet, Tunisia, December 27-29 2015.
  • METHODICA'2015: The 12th workshop on Methods for the Adaptive Distributed Software, Hammamet, Tunisia, May 13-15 2015.
  • METHODICA-I'2013: The 10th workshop on Methods for the Adaptive Distributed Software, Sfax, Tunisia, December 23-25 2013.
  • METHODICA-II'2012: The 9th workshop on Methods for the Adaptive Distributed Software, Hammamet, Tunisia, December 22-24 2012.

Teaching

  • Mathematical Logic
  • Artificial Intelligence
  • Theory of Graphs
  • Initiation to the Conception
  • Object Oriented Modeling (UML)
  • Database
  • Object Oriented Programing (JAVA)
  • Microsoft Office Access
  • C2I
 
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