Comparing Software Architecture Descriptions and Raw Source-Code: A Statistical Analysis of Maintainability Metrics

Authors

Eudisley Gomes dos Anjos
Fernando Castor
Mário Alberto Zenha-Rela

Abstract

The software systems have been exposed to constant changes in a short period of time. It requires high maintainable systems and makes maintainability one of the most important quality attributes. In this work we performed a statistical analysis of maintainability metrics in three mainstream open-source applications, Tomcat (webserver), Jedit (text editor) and Vuze (a peer to peer client). The metrics are applied to source-code and to derived similar architectural metrics using scatter plot, Pearson’s correlation coefficient and significance tests. The observations contradict the common assumption that software quality attributes (aka non-functional requirements) are mostly determined at the architectural level and raise new issues for future works in this field.

Keywords

Software Engineering, Maintainability, Software Architecture, OSS

Subject

Software Engineering

Related Project

AFFIDAVIT - Automating the Proof of Quality Attributes for Large Scale Software Architectures