A service-based web portal for integrated reverse engineering and program comprehension

Open source software systems have poor or inexistent documentation and contributors are often scattered or missing. The reuse-based composition and maintenance of open source software systems therefore implies that program comprehension becomes a critical activity if all the embedded behavior is to be preserved. Program comprehension has traditionally been addressed by reverse engineering techniques which retrieve system design models such as class diagrams. These abstract representations provide a key artifact during migration or evolution. However, this method may retrieve large complex class diagrams which do not ensure a suitable program comprehension. This chapter attempts to improve program comprehension by providing a model-driven reverse engineering technique with which to obtain business processes models that can be used in combination with system design models such as class diagrams. The advantage of this approach is that business processes provide a simple system viewpoint at a higher abstraction level and filter out particular technical details related to source code. The technique is fully developed and tool-supported within an R&D project about global software development in which collaborate two universities and five companies. The automation of the approach facilitates its validation and transference through an industrial case study involving two open source systems.

Download Full-text

Alternatives to the Knowledge Discovery Metamodel: An Investigation

International Journal of Software Engineering and Knowledge Engineering ◽

10.1142/s0218194017500413 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 27 (07) ◽

pp. 1097-1128 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Francesca Arcelli Fontana ◽

Claudia Raibulet ◽

Marco Zanoni

Keyword(s):

Reverse Engineering ◽

Knowledge Discovery ◽

Software Evolution ◽

Program Comprehension ◽

Large Share ◽

Related Research ◽

Engineering Program ◽

Management Group ◽

Information Interchange ◽

Abstraction Levels

To better understand and exploit the knowledge necessary to comprehend and evolve an existing system, different models can be extracted from it. Models represent the extracted information at various abstraction levels, and are useful to document, maintain, and reengineer the system. The Knowledge Discovery Metamodel (KDM) has been defined by the object management group as a meta-model supporting a large share of reverse engineering activities. Its specification has also been adopted by the ISO in 2012. This paper explores and describes alternative meta-models proposed in the literature to support reverse engineering, program comprehension, and software evolution activities. We focus on the similarity and differences of the alternative meta-models with KDM, trying to understand the potentials of reciprocal information interchange. We describe KDM and other five meta-models, plus their extensions available in the literature and their diffusion in the reverse engineering community. We also investigate the approaches using KDM and the five meta-models. In the paper, we underline the limited reuse of models for reverse engineering, and identify potential directions for future related research, to enhance the existing models and ease the exchange of information among them.

Download Full-text

Model-Driven Reverse Engineering of Open Source Systems

Computer Systems and Software Engineering ◽

10.4018/978-1-5225-3923-0.ch041 ◽

2017 ◽

pp. 1029-1051

Author(s):

Ricardo Perez-Castillo ◽

Mario Piattini

Keyword(s):

Reverse Engineering ◽

System Design ◽

Open Source ◽

Business Processes ◽

Program Comprehension ◽

Software Systems ◽

Design Models ◽

Model Driven ◽

Class Diagrams ◽

Open Source Systems

Open source software systems have poor or inexistent documentation and contributors are often scattered or missing. The reuse-based composition and maintenance of open source software systems therefore implies that program comprehension becomes a critical activity if all the embedded behavior is to be preserved. Program comprehension has traditionally been addressed by reverse engineering techniques which retrieve system design models such as class diagrams. These abstract representations provide a key artifact during migration or evolution. However, this method may retrieve large complex class diagrams which do not ensure a suitable program comprehension. This chapter attempts to improve program comprehension by providing a model-driven reverse engineering technique with which to obtain business processes models that can be used in combination with system design models such as class diagrams. The advantage of this approach is that business processes provide a simple system viewpoint at a higher abstraction level and filter out particular technical details related to source code. The technique is fully developed and tool-supported within an R&D project about global software development in which collaborate two universities and five companies. The automation of the approach facilitates its validation and transference through an industrial case study involving two open source systems.

Download Full-text

Model-Driven Reverse Engineering of Open Source Systems

Advances in Business Information Systems and Analytics - Information Systems and Technology for Organizational Agility, Intelligence, and Resilience ◽

10.4018/978-1-4666-5970-4.ch007 ◽

2014 ◽

pp. 139-160

Author(s):

Ricardo Perez-Castillo ◽

Mario Piattini

Keyword(s):

Reverse Engineering ◽

System Design ◽

Open Source ◽

Business Processes ◽

Program Comprehension ◽

Software Systems ◽

Design Models ◽

Model Driven ◽

Class Diagrams ◽

Open Source Systems

Open source software systems have poor or inexistent documentation and contributors are often scattered or missing. The reuse-based composition and maintenance of open source software systems therefore implies that program comprehension becomes a critical activity if all the embedded behavior is to be preserved. Program comprehension has traditionally been addressed by reverse engineering techniques which retrieve system design models such as class diagrams. These abstract representations provide a key artifact during migration or evolution. However, this method may retrieve large complex class diagrams which do not ensure a suitable program comprehension. This chapter attempts to improve program comprehension by providing a model-driven reverse engineering technique with which to obtain business processes models that can be used in combination with system design models such as class diagrams. The advantage of this approach is that business processes provide a simple system viewpoint at a higher abstraction level and filter out particular technical details related to source code. The technique is fully developed and tool-supported within an R&D project about global software development in which collaborate two universities and five companies. The automation of the approach facilitates its validation and transference through an industrial case study involving two open source systems.

Download Full-text