Lattix Inc., the provider of innovative software architecture management solutions, announced at NetBeans Software Day at the 2006 JavaOne Conference that it has joined the NetBeans Partner program and is introducing Lattix LDM for NetBeans. With this new NetBeans plugin, Lattix further extends developers’ capabilities to visualize and maintain the architecture during application development by delivering the power of Lightweight Dependency Models to formalize, communicate and control the architecture of NetBeans projects.

“We are very pleased to have Lattix join our Partner program and deliver its innovative solution on NetBeans,” said Judith Lilienfeld, Sun's manager of Java Tools Evangelism. “The endorsement of NetBeans by Lattix will further extend the capabilities of NetBeans developers to visualize and maintain their architecture during application development.”

Lattix has pioneered an approach that uses system interdependencies to create an accurate blueprint of large, mission-critical software systems. Lattix LDM for NetBeans is the first commercial product to use a dependency structure matrix for a highly compact and scaleable representation of the entire system. With the LDM approach, architects and developers can analyze their architecture in detail, edit the structure to create what-if scenarios, and then specify design rules to formalize and communicate that architecture to the entire development organization. 

“We are excited about our participation in the NetBeans Partner program. NetBeans users need the capability to map their application architecture to the actual code,” said Neeraj Sangal, president and founder of Lattix. “They now will have the means to test the architecture, detect violations while coding and prevent architectural erosion.”

Map architecture to actual code: Seamlessly go from the big picture to the detail; select a subsystem and examine the code associated with its dependencies 

Test architecture and detect architectural violations while coding: Maintain the architecture during actual development and prevent architectural erosion

Refactor architecture: Combine architectural remediation suggested by Lattix LDM with NetBeans’ refactoring capabilities in order to decouple subsystems, remove unwanted dependencies and rename subsystems so the code organization reflects the intended architecture. 

Lattix LDM is part of the software architecture management solutions from Lattix, which enable companies to improve and maintain quality, enhance testability, lower costs through more effective development, and manage risks by understanding the impact of proposed changes.