Statistical and Machine Learning Methods for Software Fault Prediction Using CK Metric Suite: A Comparative Analysis

Experimental validation of software metrics in fault prediction for object-oriented methods using statistical and machine learning methods is necessary. By the process of validation the quality of software product in a software organization is ensured. Object-oriented metrics play a crucial role in predicting faults. This paper examines the application of linear regression, logistic regression, and artificial neural network methods for software fault prediction using Chidamber and Kemerer (CK) metrics. Here, fault is considered as dependent variable and CK metric suite as independent variables. Statistical methods such as linear regression, logistic regression, and machine learning methods such as neural network (and its different forms) are being applied for detecting faults associated with the classes. The comparison approach was applied for a case study, that is, Apache integration framework (AIF) version 1.6. The analysis highlights the significance of weighted method per class (WMC) metric for fault classification, and also the analysis shows that the hybrid approach of radial basis function network obtained better fault prediction rate when compared with other three neural network models.

Understanding Contributor to Developer Turnover Patterns in OSS Projects: A Case Study of Apache Projects

OSS projects are dynamic in nature. Developers contribute to a project for a certain period of time and later leave the project or join other projects of high interest. Hence, the OSS community always welcomes members who can attain the role of a developer in a project. In this paper, we investigate contributions made by members who have attained the role of a developer. In particular, we study the contributions made by the members in terms of bugs reported, comments on bugs, source-code patch submissions, and their social relation with other members of an OSS community. Further, we study the significance of nondevelopers contribution and investigate if and to what extent they play a role in the long-term survival of an OSS project. Moreover, we investigate the ratio of contributions made by a member before and after attaining the role of a developer. We have outlined 4 research questions in this regard and further discuss our findings based on the research questions by taking into account data from software repositories of 4 different Apache projects.

Feedback for Programming Assignments Using Software-Metrics and Reference Code

Feedback for student programming assignments on quality is a tedious and laborious task for the instructor. In this paper, we make use of few object-oriented software metrics along with a reference code that is provided by the instructor to analyze student programs and provide feedback. The empirical study finds those software metrics that can be used on the considered programming assignments and the way reference code helps the instructor to assess them. This approach helps the instructor to easily find out quality issues in student programs. Feedback to such assignments can be provided using the guidelines which we will be discussing. We also perform an experimental study on programming assignments of sophomore students who were enrolled in an object-oriented programming course to validate our approach.

Web Services Conversation Adaptation Using Conditional Substitution Semantics of Application Domain Concepts

Internet of Services (IoS) vision allows users to allocate and consume different web services on the fly without any prior knowledge regarding the chosen services. Such chosen services should automatically interact with one another in a transparent manner to accomplish the required users' goals. As services are chosen on the fly, service conversations are not necessarily compatible due to incompatibilities between services signatures and/or conversation protocols, creating obstacles for realizing the IoS vision. One approach for overcoming this problem is to use conversation adapters. However, such conversion adapters must be automatically created on the fly as chosen services are only known at run time. Existing approaches for automatic adapter generation are syntactic and very limited; hence they cannot be adopted in such dynamic environments. To overcome such limitation, this paper proposes a novel approach for automatic adapter generation that uses conditional substitution semantics between application domain concepts and operations to automatically generate the adapter conversion functions. Such conditional substitution semantics are captured using a concepts substitutability enhanced graph required to be part of application domain ontologies. Experiments results show that the proposed approach provides more accurate conversation adaptation results when compared against existing syntactic adapter generation approaches.

Formal Development of System of Systems

Characterising for contemporary systems is their dependence on constituent systems to provide information, functionality, and scalability. Moreover, as the tasks that systems perform are ever more intimate and critical in their nature, reliability and correctness are great concerns. On these matters, we outline a methodology for formal integration of systems. We claim this formal approach to assist in managing the complexity and correctness, in preserving reliability and in respecting the independence of the constituent systems. As a proof of concept, we integrate two in-house control systems specified independently in the Event-B language with the Rodin Platform tool. Moreover, we show how to introduce a new functionality that is only possible due to the integration. Hence, we formally construct a system of systems and provide the methods for hierarchical integration of those.

Interlinking Developer Identities within and across Open Source Projects: The Linked Data Approach

Software developers use various software repositories in order to interact with each other or to solve related problems. These repositories provide a rich source of information for a wide range of tasks. However, one issue to overcome in order to make this information useful is the identification and interlinking of multiple identities of developers. In this paper, we propose a Linked Data-based methodology to interlink and integrate multiple identities of a developer found in different software repositories of a project as well as across repositories of multiple projects. Providing such interlinking will enable us to keep track of a developer’s activity not only within a single project but also across multiple projects. The methodology will be presented in general and applied to 5 Apache projects as a case study. Further, we show that the few methods suggested so far are not always appropriate to overcome the developer identification problem.

End User Development: Survey of an Emerging Field for Empowering People

The purpose of this paper is to introduce the motivations behind end user development, discuss its basic concepts and roots, and review the current state of art. Various approaches are discussed and classified in terms of their main features and the technologies and platforms for which they have been developed. Lastly, the paper provides an indication of interesting possibilities for further evolution.

Regression Test Reduction for Object-Oriented Software: A Control Call Graph Based Technique and Associated Tool

This paper presents a selective regression testing technique and an associated tool for object-oriented software. The technique is based on the concept of Control Call Graphs, which are a reduced form of traditional Control Flow Graphs. It uses static analysis of the source code of the program. The developed tool (1) identifies the Control Call Paths potentially impacted by changes, (2) selects, from an existing test suite, the appropriate test cases, and (3) generates new JUnit test cases for control call paths that are not covered by existing tests (new ones, or those whose structure has been modified after changes). In this way, the approach supports an incremental update of the test suite. The selected JUnit test cases, including the new ones, are automatically executed. Three concrete case studies are reported to provide evidence of the feasibility of the approach and its benefits in terms of reduction of regression testing effort.

Decision Graphs and Their Application to Software Testing

Control flow graphs are a well-known graphical representation of programs that capture the control flow but abstract from program details. In this paper, we derive decision graphs that reduce control flow graphs but preserve the branching structure of programs. As an application to software engineering, we use decision graphs to compare and clarify different definitions of branch covering in software testing.

Towards the Consolidation of a Diagramming Suite for Agent-Oriented Modelling Languages

Whilst several agent-oriented modelling languages have been developed by independent research groups, it is now appropriate to consider a consolidation of these various approaches. There are arguably three things that need consolidation and future standardization: individual symbols, the underpinning metamodel, and the diagram types. Here we address only the third issue by extending an earlier analysis that resulted in recommendations for various diagram types for the modelling of a multiagent system (MAS). Here, we take each of these previously recommended diagram types and see how each is realized in a wide variety (over 20) of current agent-oriented software engineering (AOSE) methodologies. We also take the opportunity to express, as exemplars, some of these diagram types using the recently published FAML notation.