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Identification and visualization of variability implementations in object-oriented variability-rich systems: a symmetry-based approach

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Abstract

Most modern object-oriented software systems are variability-rich, despite that they may not be developed as product lines. Their variability is implemented by several traditional techniques in combination, such as inheritance, overloading, or design patterns. As domain features or variation points with variants are not a by-product of these techniques, variability in code assets of such systems is implicit, and hardly documented, hampering qualities such as understandability and maintainability. In this article, we present an approach for automatic identification and visualization of variability implementation places, that is, variation points with variants, in variability-rich systems. To uniformly identify them, we propose to rely on the existing symmetries in the different software constructs and patterns. We then propose to visualize them according to their density. By means of our realized toolchain implementing the approach, symfinder, we report on a threefold evaluation, (i) on the identified potential variability in sixteen large open-source systems and symfinder ’s scalability, (ii) on measuring symfinder ’s precision and robustness when mapping identified variability to domain features, and (iii) on its usage by a software architect. Results show that symfinder can indeed help in identifying and comprehending the variability of the targeted systems.

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Notes

  1. Their definition is given in Sect. 2.1.

  2. https://github.com/DeathStar3/symfinder.

  3. https://deathstar3.github.io/symfinder-demo/jrn20.html.

  4. https://github.com/DeathStar3/symfinder.

  5. https://neo4j.com/.

  6. https://neo4j.com/developer/cypher/.

  7. https://www.docker.com/.

  8. A version supporting both Java and C++ is also available at https://deathstar3.github.io/symfinder-demo/splc2020.html.

  9. This second parsing stage is needed as, due to limitations of Eclipse JDT, the structure of the whole codebase is needed in the database in order to query it and determine the correct types of each element.

  10. Our identification of local symmetries in software constructs is using a graph representation of the codebase, but it must not be confused with the graph symmetry detection or automorphisms (McKay et al. 1981).

  11. The shapes in this path is the package’s name in Java.

  12. https://deathstar3.github.io/symfinder-demo/identification-method.html.

  13. https://d3js.org/.

  14. http://www.cril.univ-artois.fr/~leberre/.

  15. For counting the lines of code we used gocloc: https://github.com/hhatto/gocloc/.

  16. https://deathstar3.github.io/symfinder-demo/JRN20/standard_version/elasticsearch-v6.8.5.html.

  17. The catalog: https://but4reuse.github.io/espla_catalog/. According to its our last visit on November 20, 2020.

  18. The whole ArgoUML’s visualization is available at https://deathstar3.github.io/symfinder-demo/JRN20/hotspots_version/argoUML-bcae37.html.

  19. Sat4j’s code: https://gitlab.ow2.org/sat4j/sat4j/-/tree/master/org.sat4j.core.

  20. Sat4j’s ground truth: https://deathstar3.github.io/symfinder-demo/JRN20-files/Features.pdf

  21. The whole Sat4j’s visualization is available at https://deathstar3.github.io/symfinder-demo/JRN20/hotspots_version/sat4j-22374e5e.html.

  22. While the term ’tracing’ / ’trace links’ is used in the ground truth, we will distinguish from this term in this experiment by using ’mapping’ / ’mapping links’ for vp-s  and variants mapped to features, although both of them have the same meaning.

  23. https://deathstar3.github.io/symfinder-demo/mapping_process.html.

  24. http://www.cril.univ-artois.fr/~leberre/.

  25. This request was considered and is now addressed: https://deathstar3.github.io/symfinder-demo/splc2020.html.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Université de Rennes 1, Inria/IRISA, Rennes, France

    Xhevahire Tërnava

  2. Université Côte d’Azur, CNRS, I3S, Sophia-Antipolis, France

    Johann Mortara & Philippe Collet

  3. Université d’Artois, CNRS, CRIL, Lens, France

    Daniel Le Berre

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  1. Xhevahire Tërnava
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  2. Johann Mortara
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  3. Philippe Collet
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  4. Daniel Le Berre
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Correspondence to Xhevahire Tërnava.

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Tërnava, X., Mortara, J., Collet, P. et al. Identification and visualization of variability implementations in object-oriented variability-rich systems: a symmetry-based approach. Autom Softw Eng 29, 25 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10515-022-00329-x

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