Metrics for Evolution of Aspect Oriented Software

TL;DR

This paper introduces new metrics to quantify the evolution of Aspect Oriented Software, using a case study of AJHotDraw to analyze how its versions change over time.

Contribution

It defines novel metrics for measuring AO software evolution and demonstrates their application through a case study on AJHotDraw.

Findings

Metrics effectively capture software evolution dynamics.

Analysis of AJHotDraw versions reveals evolution patterns.

Metrics help compare different software versions over time.

Abstract

Aspect Oriented Software Development (AOSD) is a promising methodology which provides powerful techniques to improve the modularity of the software by separating the cross-cutting concerns from the core functionality. Since evolution is a major requirement for the sustainability of any software, it is necessary to quantitatively measure its impact. In order to quantify, it is essential to define metrics that will capture the evolution of Aspect Oriented (AO) software. It is also necessary to compare the metric values of various versions of software to draw inferences on the evolution dynamics of AO software. This needs identification of artifacts that were added, deleted or modified across versions and study the consequence of these types of changes. This paper defines a new set of metrics for measuring the evolution of Aspect Oriented software. As a case study, an aspect refactored software, AJHotDraw has been chosen and its four versions have been analyzed for their capability to evolve over time.