Software objects change: problems and solution
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Authors
Ajila, SA
Issue Date
2000
Type
Language
en
Keywords
Software maintenance , Objects change , Impact analysis , Software life cycle
Alternative Title
Abstract
The development of Software is a long term investment. This investment normally takes
a lot of money and human efforts. So many things may change during the life span of
a Software. The requirement and the specification upon which the need was based may
change. The environment on which the Software was ported may also change. Because of
this evolutionary trend in Software, there will be need to modify parts of the system in
order to accommodate the change. This modification may lead to problems in the entire
software system that may be very costly in terms of system consistency and quality. This
problem is due to the fact that a change in a part of a system may affect other parts of
the software system(propagation of change).
Another reason that may lead to software objects change is the performance. Efficacy
and viability are the two most important qualities that one will expect from a Software.
This is demonstrated by the high cost of software maintenance. In fact, the existing data
show that the cost of software maintenance is between 32% to 75% of the total cost of
development. In order to address these problems we need a tool that will aid in analyzing
the propagation and the impact of software objects change.
In this paper we present a framework for the purpose of identifying the problem as well
as a knowledge based model for impact analysis and propagation of a change. This model
is not based on any programming language or design method. It can be applied on the
basis of the problem at hand. It also takes into consideration the life cycle of a software.·
In this model, we identify the dependencies between the various objects in the software.
These dependencies are based on the domain specific view of the different components of
the software. In order to validate our solution, we examine its application on the Ada
programming language.
Description
Citation
Ajila, S.A. (1997) Software objects change: problems and solution. Proceedings of the 1997 National Research and Development Conference: Towards 2000, South African Institute of Computer Science and Information Technology), Riverside Sun, 13-14 November, 2000, edited by L.M. Venter and R.R. Lombard (PUCHEE, VTC)