1. A method of building a software system pipeline comprising a set of elements, comprising: storing dependency data for one or more elements, the dependency data for at least a particular element having been derived from a data model generated as a result of executing at least one other pipeline in which the particular element was included; identifying a first element; associating a second element to the first element to form a portion of the software system pipeline, wherein the particular element is one of the first and second elements; retrieving dependency data for at least one of the first and second elements, at least some of the retrieved dependency data being dependency data that was derived from the data model; and automatically generating descriptor data for the software system pipeline based on the retrieved dependency data; wherein at least one of the steps is carried out in software executing in a hardware element.
1. A method of building a software system pipeline comprising a set of elements, comprising: storing dependency data for one or more elements, the dependency data for at least a particular element having been derived from a data model generated as a result of executing at least one other pipeline in which the particular element was included; identifying a first element; associating a second element to the first element to form a portion of the software system pipeline, wherein the particular element is one of the first and second elements; retrieving dependency data for at least one of the first and second elements, at least some of the retrieved dependency data being dependency data that was derived from the data model; and automatically generating descriptor data for the software system pipeline based on the retrieved dependency data; wherein at least one of the steps is carried out in software executing in a hardware element. 5. The method as described in claim 1 wherein the first element is identified using a visual editor.