Package Fingerprints: A visual summary of package interface usage

Context: Object-oriented languages such as Java, Smalltalk, and C++ structure their programs using packages. Maintainers of large systems need to understand how packages relate to each other, but this task is complex because packages often have multiple clients and play different roles (class container, code ownership. . . ). Several approaches have been proposed, among which the use of cohesion and coupling metrics. Such metrics help identify candidate packages for restructuring; however, they do not help maintainers actually understand the structure and interrelationships between packages. Objectives: In this paper, we use pre-attentive processing as the basis for package visualization and see to what extent it could be used in package understanding. Method: We present the package fingerprint, a 2D visualization of the references made to and from a package. The proposed visualization offers a semantically rich, but compact and zoomable views centered on packages. We focus on two ...

• Type: Journal
• Year: 2010
• Where: INFSOF
• Authors: Hani Abdeen, Stéphane Ducasse, Damien Pollet, Ilham Alloui
• Keywords: INFSOF 2010, Large Systems, Package Visualization, Package fingerprint