Improving the reuse possibilities of the behavioral aspects of object-oriented domain models.

Reuse of domain models is often limited to the reuse of the structural aspects of the domain (e.g. by means of generic data models). In object-oriented models, reuse of dynamic aspects is achieved by reusing the methods of domain classes. Because in the object-oriented approach any behavior is attached to a class, it is impossible to reuse behavior without at the same time reusing the class. In addition, because of the message passing paradigm, object interaction must be specified as a method attached to one class which is invoked by another class. In this way object interaction is hidden in the behavioral aspects of classes. This makes object interaction schemas difficult to reuse and customize. The focus of this paper is on improving the reuse of object-oriented domain models. This is achieved by centering the behavioral aspects around the concept of business events.Model; Models;

Analogical specification reuse during requirements analysis

This thesis investigates analogy as a paradigm for retrieving, understanding and customising reusable specifications during requirements engineering. Cooperation between software engineers and support tools is necessary for effective analogical reuse. Retrieval uses a computational implementation of analogical reasoning to search and match many reusable specifications. On the other hand understanding, transferring and adapting specifications requires cooperation between the tool and software engineer. Cooperative support was designed for less-experienced software engineers with most to gain from successful specification reuse. Deliverables from this research have implications for software engineering, artificial intelligence, cognitive science and human-computer interaction. Specification retrieval is founded on a framework of software engineering analogies. This framework includes a set of domain abstractions describing key facts about software engineering domains. A computational model of analogical reasoning which matches domain descriptions to these abstractions was designed, implemented and evaluated during user studies with a prototype reuse advisor. An intelligent dialogue acts as a front-end to this retrieval mechanism by acquiring key domain facts prior to retrieving domain abstractions. This dialogue was designed from empirical studies of software engineering behaviour during requirements capture and modelling. Design of support tools for specification understanding and transfer was based on cognitive task and reasoning models of software engineering behaviour during analogical reuse and mental models of analogical understanding. Two empirical studies of inexperienced software engineers identified problematic mental laziness manifest as specification copying. A third study of expert software engineers who successfully reused specifications identified strategies for effective reuse. Detailed findings from all three studies informed the design of tool-based support for specification understanding and transfer. Findings also have implications for the design of tools to support other requirements engineering activities

Interaction systems design and the protocol- and middleware-centred paradigms in distributed application development

This paper aims at demonstrating the benefits and importance of interaction systems design in the development of distributed applications. We position interaction systems design with respect to two paradigms that have influenced the design of distributed applications: the middleware-centred and the protocol-centred paradigm. We argue that interaction systems that support application-level interactions should be explicitly designed, using the externally observable behaviour of the interaction system as a starting point in interaction systems design. This practice has two main benefits: to promote a systematic design method, in which the correctness of the design of an interaction system can be assessed against its service specification; and, to shield the design of application parts that use the interaction system from choices in the design of the supporting interaction system

Generic domain models in software engineering

This paper outlines three research directions related to domain-specific software development: (1) reuse of generic models for domain-specific software development; (2) empirical evidence to determine these generic models, namely elicitation of mental knowledge schema possessed by expert software developers; and (3) exploitation of generic domain models to assist modelling of specific applications. It focuses on knowledge acquisition for domain-specific software development, with emphasis on tool support for the most important phases of software development

A literature review of expert problem solving using analogy

We consider software project cost estimation from a problem solving perspective. Taking a cognitive psychological approach, we argue that the algorithmic basis for CBR tools is not representative of human problem solving and this mismatch could account for inconsistent results. We describe the fundamentals of problem solving, focusing on experts solving ill-defined problems. This is supplemented by a systematic literature review of empirical studies of expert problem solving of non-trivial problems. We identified twelve studies. These studies suggest that analogical reasoning plays an important role in problem solving, but that CBR tools do not model this in a biologically plausible way. For example, the ability to induce structure and therefore find deeper analogies is widely seen as the hallmark of an expert. However, CBR tools fail to provide support for this type of reasoning for prediction. We conclude this mismatch between experts’ cognitive processes and software tools contributes to the erratic performance of analogy-based prediction

A communication channel model of the software process

Beginning research into a noisy communication channel analogy of software development process productivity, in order to establish quantifiable behavior and theoretical bounds is discussed. The analogy leads to a fundamental mathematical relationship between human productivity and the amount of information supplied by the developers, the capacity of the human channel for processing and transmitting information, the software product yield (object size) the work effort, requirements efficiency, tool and process efficiency, and programming environment advantage. An upper bound to productivity is derived that shows that software reuse is the only means that can lead to unbounded productivity growth; practical considerations of size and cost of reusable components may reduce this to a finite bound

Design: One, but in different forms

This overview paper defends an augmented cognitively oriented generic-design hypothesis: there are both significant similarities between the design activities implemented in different situations and crucial differences between these and other cognitive activities; yet, characteristics of a design situation (related to the design process, the designers, and the artefact) introduce specificities in the corresponding cognitive activities and structures that are used, and in the resulting designs. We thus augment the classical generic-design hypothesis with that of different forms of designing. We review the data available in the cognitive design research literature and propose a series of candidates underlying such forms of design, outlining a number of directions requiring further elaboration