Using real options to select stable Middleware-induced software architectures

The requirements that force decisions towards building distributed system architectures are usually of a non-functional nature. Scalability, openness, heterogeneity, and fault-tolerance are examples of such non-functional requirements. The current trend is to build distributed systems with middleware, which provide the application developer with primitives for managing the complexity of distribution, system resources, and for realising many of the non-functional requirements. As non-functional requirements evolve, the `coupling' between the middleware and architecture becomes the focal point for understanding the stability of the distributed software system architecture in the face of change. It is hypothesised that the choice of a stable distributed software architecture depends on the choice of the underlying middleware and its flexibility in responding to future changes in non-functional requirements. Drawing on a case study that adequately represents a medium-size component-based distributed architecture, it is reported how a likely future change in scalability could impact the architectural structure of two versions, each induced with a distinct middleware: one with CORBA and the other with J2EE. An option-based model is derived to value the flexibility of the induced-architectures and to guide the selection. The hypothesis is verified to be true for the given change. The paper concludes with some observations that could stimulate future research in the area of relating requirements to software architectures

How Scale Affects Structure in Java Programs

Many internal software metrics and external quality attributes of Java programs correlate strongly with program size. This knowledge has been used pervasively in quantitative studies of software through practices such as normalization on size metrics. This paper reports size-related super- and sublinear effects that have not been known before. Findings obtained on a very large collection of Java programs -- 30,911 projects hosted at Google Code as of Summer 2011 -- unveils how certain characteristics of programs vary disproportionately with program size, sometimes even non-monotonically. Many of the specific parameters of nonlinear relations are reported. This result gives further insights for the differences of "programming in the small" vs. "programming in the large." The reported findings carry important consequences for OO software metrics, and software research in general: metrics that have been known to correlate with size can now be properly normalized so that all the information that is left in them is size-independent.Comment: ACM Conference on Object-Oriented Programming, Systems, Languages and Applications (OOPSLA), October 2015. (Preprint

Empirical analysis of impacts of instance-driven changes in ontologies

Changes in the characterization of instances in digital contents are one of the rationales to change or evolve ontologies which support the domain. These changes can impacts on one or more of interrelated ontologies. Before implementing changes, their impact on the target ontology, other dependent ontologies or dependent systems should be analysed. We investigate three concerns for the determination of impacts of changes in ontologies: representation of changes to ensure minimum impact, impact determination and integrity determination. Key elements of our solution are the operationalization of change operations to minimize impacts, a parameterization approach for the determination of impacts, a categorization scheme for identified impacts, and prioritization technique for change operations based on the severity of impacts

Using agent based simulation to empirically examine complexity in carbon footprint business process

Through the critical analysis of the extant literature, it is observed that Simulation is widely used as a research method in Natural Sciences, Engineering and Social Sciences, in addition to argumentation and formalisation as the third way of carrying out research. Simulation is not so widely used in Business and Management research as it ought to have been, though this is changing for the better with the technological advances in computers and their computational power. These technological advances enhance the capability of theoretical research models, in defining a problem and their use in empirically examining a solution to the problem in simulated reality, like never before. Management journal searches for “Simulation and Complexity Theory” returned nil or zero returns, which explain that this combination is not popular in management research, though they are used individually more often. The major objective of this paper is to analyse some of the conceptual (or theoretical) and methodological (or empirical) contributions that Agent Based Simulation and Complexity Theory can make to the business and management community in their business process related research In view of this, some basic ideas are discussed of using Agent Based Simulation as a method in Business and Management Studies research and how an Agent Based Model can be applied to a business process as complex as Carbon Footprint. It is in this context that the use of Complexity as the base theory to empirically examine a business process is discussed. Throughout this article, our research on complex adaptive systems (e.g., Accounting Information System) in continuously changing organisations managing complex business processes (e.g., Carbon Footprint business process) is considered as the basis for illustrating some of the concepts. Through this article, avenues for further management research using these tools and methodology are suggested

Detecting Functional Requirements Inconsistencies within Multi-teams Projects Framed into a Model-based Web Methodology

One of the most essential processes within the software project life cycle is the REP (Requirements Engineering Process) because it allows specifying the software product requirements. This specification should be as consistent as possible because it allows estimating in a suitable manner the effort required to obtain the final product. REP is complex in itself, but this complexity is greatly increased in big, distributed and heterogeneous projects with multiple analyst teams and high integration between functional modules. This paper presents an approach for the systematic conciliation of functional requirements in big projects dealing with a web model-based approach and how this approach may be implemented in the context of the NDT (Navigational Development Techniques): a web methodology. This paper also describes the empirical evaluation in the CALIPSOneo project by analyzing the improvements obtained with our approach.Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad TIN2013-46928-C3-3-RMinisterio de Economía y Competitividad TIN2015-71938-RED

An Approach for the Empirical Validation of Software Complexity Measures

Software metrics are widely accepted tools to control and assure software quality. A large number of software metrics with a variety of content can be found in the literature; however most of them are not adopted in industry as they are seen as irrelevant to needs, as they are unsupported, and the major reason behind this is due to improper empirical validation. This paper tries to identify possible root causes for the improper empirical validation of the software metrics. A practical model for the empirical validation of software metrics is proposed along with root causes. The model is validated by applying it to recently proposed and well known metrics

Software development: A paradigm for the future

A new paradigm for software development that treats software development as an experimental activity is presented. It provides built-in mechanisms for learning how to develop software better and reusing previous experience in the forms of knowledge, processes, and products. It uses models and measures to aid in the tasks of characterization, evaluation and motivation. An organization scheme is proposed for separating the project-specific focus from the organization's learning and reuse focuses of software development. The implications of this approach for corporations, research and education are discussed and some research activities currently underway at the University of Maryland that support this approach are presented