Abstract: A method and apparatus for encapsulating an application tool into a computer-aided software development system that includes a number of standard software development tools. The application tool is integrated into the software development system without modification of its code. An interface description file that defines desired operations in responding to predefined events received from the development tools and from a user interface is complied to generate a symbol table and a statement table. The symbol table and the statement table are evaluated to generate objects which define operations that are performed when responding to the predefined events. An event handler responds to the predefined events received from the development tools and from the user interface by evaluating objects corresponding to the predefined events and executing the operations defined therein. Notifications received from the development tools can be utilized to trigger predefined operations by the application tool.