Patent ID: 7624349

Claim:
A computer program product comprising one or more computer-readable storage media having thereon computer-executable instructions such that, when executed by one or more processors of a computing system, the computer-executable instructions cause the computing system to perform the following: evaluating a plurality of elements of a graphical designer, at least one element defined internal to the graphical designer and at least one element being a shared element; identifying at least one shared element and identifying at least one non-shared element, each identification being based upon a declaration of each identified element; interpreting a declarative definition of the graphical designer that includes a declaration of at least one shared element, the shared element including a component of a domain model including at least one of a domain class, a relationship amongst domain classes, and an enumeration element, and the shared element appearing in a schema definition; generating instruction sequences abiding by the specification defined by the declarative definition; an act of referring to a declarative definition of the shared element that is external to the declarative definition of the graphical designer, the act of referring not including a complete declarative definition of the shared element; and an act of implementing the shared element within the graphical designer using the declaration of the shared element in the declarative definition of the graphical designer, and using the external declarative definition of the shared element.