Inheritance software metrics on smart contracts

TL;DR

This paper empirically evaluates inheritance-based software metrics on Ethereum smart contracts, questioning their applicability due to the unique nature of Solidity-based code compared to traditional object-oriented programs.

Contribution

It investigates the relevance of inheritance metrics for smart contracts, highlighting differences from traditional OO programming and proposing a tailored assessment approach.

Findings

Inheritance metrics may not directly apply to smart contracts.

Smart contracts tend to have simpler inheritance structures.

Traditional OO metrics require reinterpretation for blockchain contexts.

Abstract

Blockchain systems have gained substantial traction recently, partly due to the potential of decentralized immutable mediation of economic activities. Ethereum is a prominent example that has the provision for executing stateful computing scripts known as Smart Contracts. These smart contracts resemble traditional programs, but with immutability being the core differentiating factor. Given their immutability and potential high monetary value, it becomes imperative to develop high-quality smart contracts. Software metrics have traditionally been an essential tool in determining programming quality. Given the similarity between smart contracts (written in Solidity for Ethereum) and object-oriented (OO) programming, OO metrics would appear applicable. In this paper, we empirically evaluate inheritance-based metrics as applied to smart contracts. We adopt this focus because, traditionally, inheritance has been linked to a more complex codebase which we posit is not the case with Solidity based smart contracts. In this work, we evaluate the hypothesis that, due to the differences in the context of smart contracts and OO programs, it may not be appropriate to use the same interpretation of inheritance based metrics for assessment.