A controlled experiment for corroborating the usefulness of class diagram metrics at the early phases of OO developments

The quality of class diagrams is critical because it has a great influence on the quality of the object oriented information system (OOIS) which are finally delivered. This fact motivated us to define a set of measures for evaluating the structural complexity (an internal quality attribute) of class diagrams made using the Unified Modeling Language (UML), which nowadays is the standard language for object oriented modelling. These measures could be used to predict class diagram external quality characteristics, such as maintainability, early in the OOIS life-cycle. In order to corroborate the practical utility of those metrics, we have put them under empirical validation by means of a controlled experiment. The description of each of the steps carried out to perform the experiment and the construction of the prediction model for class diagram maintainability are the main goals of this paper. Keywords. object oriented metrics, class diagram structural complexity, class diagram maintaina...

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2001
• Where: ADIS
• Authors: Marcela Genero, José A. Olivas, Mario Piattini, Francisco P. Romero
• Keywords: ADIS 2001, Class Diagram, Class Diagram Maintainability, Object Oriented, Software Engineering