A Survey and Comparison of Industrial and Academic Research on the Evolution of Software Product Lines

TL;DR

This paper surveys and compares research on the maintenance and evolution of software product lines, highlighting industry and academic perspectives to guide future systematic evolution strategies.

Contribution

It provides a comprehensive comparison of industry and academic research on software product line evolution, identifying gaps and suggesting future research directions.

Findings

Research focus has shifted from initial development to ongoing maintenance and evolution.

Industry and academia show differing interests in software product line evolution.

Future research should aim for systematic and organized evolution approaches.

Abstract

Past research on software product lines has focused on the initial development of reusable assets and related challenges, such as cost estimation and implementation issues. Naturally, as software product lines are increasingly adopted throughout industry, their ongoing maintenance and evolution are getting more attention as well. However, it is not clear to what degree research is following this trend, and where the interests and demands of the industry lie. In this technical report, we provide a survey and comparison of selected publications on software product line maintenance and evolution at SPLC. In particular, we analyze and discuss similarities and differences of these papers with regard to their affiliation with industry and academia. From this, we infer directions for future research that pave the way for systematic and organized evolution of software product lines, from which industry may benefit as well.