{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,6,22]],"date-time":"2026-06-22T04:48:47Z","timestamp":1782103727871,"version":"3.54.5"},"reference-count":51,"publisher":"MDPI AG","issue":"6","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2026,6,17]],"date-time":"2026-06-17T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1781654400000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["Systems"],"abstract":"<jats:p>Rising complexity in cyber-physical systems development exposes challenges in the consistent and reusable specification of graphical domain-specific languages (DSLs). Despite the benefits of model-based systems engineering (MBSE), the absence of a standardized, life-cycle-wide specification process results in semantic inconsistencies, tool dependence, and limited interoperability. While our previous work has addressed individual stages of DSL definition, a comprehensive, standards-based process integrating these stages remains missing. Building on these foundations, this paper introduces a unified language specification process for graphical DSLs grounded in established standards\u2014the Meta-Object Facility (MOF), Unified Modeling Language (UML), Web Ontology Language (OWL), and Resource Description Framework (RDF). The process integrates three core artifacts: a tool-independent ontology capturing domain semantics, a MOF-conforming metamodel unifying abstract syntax, semantics, and concrete syntax, and a UML-profile-based implementation. To support and exemplify this process, a prototypical toolchain is introduced that enables automated transformations between these artifacts, thereby facilitating the consistent propagation of semantics from ontology to implementation. The applicability of the proposed process is demonstrated through both a top-down automotive case and a bottom-up cybersecurity DSL, illustrating its cross-domain generalizability. By explicitly structuring and connecting ontology, metamodel, and implementation, this work contributes a semantically consistent, machine-interpretable, and tool-independent specification process for graphical DSLs in MBSE.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3390\/systems14060697","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2026,6,18]],"date-time":"2026-06-18T00:49:42Z","timestamp":1781743782000},"page":"697","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/mdpi_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":0,"title":["A Unified Specification Process for Graphical Domain-Specific Languages in Model-Based Systems Engineering"],"prefix":"10.3390","volume":"14","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0009-0001-8615-7388","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Katharina","family":"Polanec","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Institute for Engineering of Products and Systems (IEPS), Otto von Guericke University Magdeburg, Universit\u00e4tsplatz 2, 39106 Magdeburg, Germany"},{"name":"Center for Dependable Systems Engineering, Salzburg University of Applied Sciences, Urstein Sued 1, 5412 Puch\/Salzburg, Austria"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0009-0002-4939-092X","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Simon","family":"Eschlberger","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Center for Dependable Systems Engineering, Salzburg University of Applied Sciences, Urstein Sued 1, 5412 Puch\/Salzburg, Austria"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0009-0002-8530-5630","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Markus","family":"Peter","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Center for Dependable Systems Engineering, Salzburg University of Applied Sciences, Urstein Sued 1, 5412 Puch\/Salzburg, Austria"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0001-5560-6075","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"David","family":"Hoffmann","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Institute for Engineering of Products and Systems (IEPS), Otto von Guericke University Magdeburg, Universit\u00e4tsplatz 2, 39106 Magdeburg, Germany"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0001-6537-9742","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Arndt","family":"L\u00fcder","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Institute for Engineering of Products and Systems (IEPS), Otto von Guericke University Magdeburg, Universit\u00e4tsplatz 2, 39106 Magdeburg, Germany"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]}],"member":"1968","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2026,6,17]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref_1","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"T\u00f6rngren, M., and Sellgren, U. 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