Java Implementation Verification Using Reverse Engineering

An approach to system verification is described in which design artefacts produced during forward engineering are automatically compared to corresponding artefacts produced during reverse engineering. The goal is to automatically determine if an implementation is consistent with the original design. In the system described, XML Metadata Interchange (XMI) representations of Unified Modelling Language (UML) class diagrams are recovered from compiled Java class files. These are automatically compared with the corresponding diagrams produced during forward engineering by software engineers using CASE tools. Examples are provided in which reversed engineered UML class diagrams differ from those produced during forward engineering but are still faithful to the original design intent. Such differences are often due to more system representations being captured in forward engineered design artefacts, the inclusion of design attributes and annotations that are not retained in the final impleme...

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2004
• Where: ACSC
• Authors: David J. A. Cooper, Benjamin Khoo, Brian R. von Konsky, Mike Robey
• Keywords: ACSC 2004, Design Artefacts, Forward Engineering, Reverse Engineering, Theoretical Computer Science