Mining software repositories for empirical validation of laws of software evolution for Java projects
by Arvinder Kaur; Vidhi Vig
International Journal of Computational Systems Engineering (IJCSYSE), Vol. 2, No. 3, 2016

Abstract: Mining of software repositories for the study of software evolution and its laws have been studied extensively for procedural languages like C but very few studies have verified these laws for object-oriented (OO) languages like Java despite the fact both follow a completely different paradigm. Also, most of the earlier studies done for Java projects do not employ statistical tests to prove or refute these laws. This paper attempts to statistically validate the Lehman's eight laws of software evolution for 11 Java projects containing 493 official releases. The study validates three: law of continuing change, self-regulation and continuing growth, out of the eight laws of software evolution. The study found that statistical tests tend to refute the law even if they have passed graphically indicating the importance of these tests and suggests reinstatement or addition of new laws with precise definitions and metrics for better analysis of the laws.

Online publication date: Thu, 08-Sep-2016

The full text of this article is only available to individual subscribers or to users at subscribing institutions.

 
Existing subscribers:
Go to Inderscience Online Journals to access the Full Text of this article.

Pay per view:
If you are not a subscriber and you just want to read the full contents of this article, buy online access here.

Complimentary Subscribers, Editors or Members of the Editorial Board of the International Journal of Computational Systems Engineering (IJCSYSE):
Login with your Inderscience username and password:

    Username:        Password:         

Forgotten your password?


Want to subscribe?
A subscription gives you complete access to all articles in the current issue, as well as to all articles in the previous three years (where applicable). See our Orders page to subscribe.

If you still need assistance, please email subs@inderscience.com