A Survey of Search-Based Refactoring for Software Maintenance

Abstract This survey reviews published materials related to the specific area of Search-Based Software Engineering that concerns software maintenance and, in particular, refactoring. The survey aims to give a comprehensive review of the use of search-based refactoring to maintain software. Fifty different papers have been selected from online databases to analyze and review the use of search-based refactoring in software engineering. The current state of the research is analyzed and patterns in the studies are investigated in order to assess gaps in the area and suggest opportunities for future research. The papers reviewed are tabulated in order to aid researchers in quickly referencing studies. The literature addresses different methods using search-based refactoring for software maintenance, as well as studies that investigate the optimization process and discuss components of the search. There are studies that analyze different software metrics, experiment with multi-objective techniques and propose refactoring tools for use. Analysis of the literature has indicated some opportunities for future research in the area. More experimentation of the techniques in an industrial environment and feedback from software developers is needed to support the approaches. Also, recent work with multi-objective techniques has shown that there are exciting possibilities for future research using these techniques with refactoring. This survey is beneficial as an introduction for any researchers aiming to work in the area of Search-Based Software Engineering with respect to software maintenance and will allow them to gain an understanding of the current landscape of the research and the insights gathered

Modelling Security Requirements Through Extending Scrum Agile Development Framework

Security is today considered as a basic foundation in software development and therefore, the modelling and implementation of security requirements is an essential part of the production of secure software systems. Information technology organisations are moving towards agile development methods in order to satisfy customers' changing requirements in light of accelerated evolution and time restrictions with their competitors in software production. Security engineering is considered difficult in these incremental and iterative methods due to the frequency of change, integration and refactoring. The objective of this work is to identify and implement practices to extend and improve agile methods to better address challenges presented by security requirements consideration and management. A major practices is security requirements capture mechanisms such as UMLsec for agile development processes. This thesis proposes an extension to the popular Scrum framework by adopting UMLsec security requirements modelling techniques with the introduction of a Security Owner role in the Scrum framework to facilitate such modelling and security requirements considerations generally. The methodology involved experimentation of the inclusion of UMLsec and the Security Owner role to determine their impact on security considerations in the software development process. The results showed that overall security requirements consideration improved and that there was a need for an additional role that has the skills and knowledge to facilitate and realise the benefits of the addition of UMLsec

Designing and implementation of robot mapping algorithm for mobile robot

.A mobile robot is an automatic machine that is capable of movement in any given environment [1]. The Capabilities of Mobile Robot(s) are: Moving around based on the user’s input, Avoiding obstacle in front of it and Calculating the path. The Criteria of Mobile Robot: Desktop size. A robot that can evolve on the desk near the computer improves drastically the student efficiency during experimentation. Wide range of possibilities from an engineering and educational point of view. To exploit this tool in various fields of education such as signal processing, automatic control, embedded programming, or distributed intelligent systems design, the robot should provide a wide set of functionalities in its basic version. User friendly. The user interface has to be simple, efficient, and intuitive. This is an important point for the acceptance of the system by the students. The broad introduction in engineering classes requires a large number of robots. Knowing that the budget of many schools is constant or decreasing, this is only feasible by reducing the cost of an individual robot. Open information. This robot has to be shared among professors, laboratories, schools and universities. An open source hardware/software development model is an effective way to achieve this goal

Usability Inspection in Model-Driven Web Development: Empirical Validation in WebML

There is a lack of empirically validated usability evaluation methods that can be applied to models in model-driven Web development. Evaluation of these models allows an early detection of usability problems perceived by the end-user. This motivated us to propose WUEP, a usability inspection method which can be integrated into different model-driven Web development processes. We previously demonstrated how WUEP can effectively be used when following the Object-Oriented Hypermedia method. In order to provide evidences about WUEP’s generalizability, this paper presents the operationalization and empirical validation of WUEP into another well-known method: WebML. The effectiveness, efficiency, perceived ease of use, and satisfaction of WUEP were evaluated in comparison to Heuristic Evaluation (HE) from the viewpoint of novice inspectors. The results show that WUEP was more effective and efficient than HE when detecting usability problems on models. Also, inspectors were satisfied when applying WUEP, and found it easier to use than HE.Fernández Martínez, A.; Abrahao Gonzales, SM.; Insfrán Pelozo, CE.; Matera, M. (2013). Usability Inspection in Model-Driven Web Development: Empirical Validation in WebML. Lecture Notes in Computer Science. 8107:740-756. doi:10.1007/978-3-642-41533-3_457407568107Abrahão, S., Iborra, E., Vanderdonckt, J.: Usability Evaluation of User Interfaces Generated with a Model-Driven Architecture Tool. In: Maturing Usability: Quality in Software, Interaction and Value, pp. 3–32. Springer (2007)Atterer, R., Schmidt, A.: Adding Usability to Web Engineering Models and Tools. In: Lowe, D.G., Gaedke, M. (eds.) ICWE 2005. LNCS, vol. 3579, pp. 36–41. Springer, Heidelberg (2005)Basili, V., Rombach, H.: The TAME Project: Towards Improvement-Oriented Software Environments. IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering 14(6), 758–773 (1988)Briand, L., Labiche, Y., Di Penta, M., Yan-Bondoc, H.: An experimental investigation of formality in UML-based development. IEEE TSE 31(10), 833–849 (2005)Carifio, J., Perla, R.: Ten Common Misunderstandings, Misconceptions, Persistent Myths and Urban Legends about Likert Scales and Likert Response Formats and their Antidotes. Journal of Social Sciences 3(3), 106–116 (2007)Ceri, S., Fraternali, P., Bongio, A.: Web modeling language (WebML): a modeling language for designing Web sites. In: 9th International World Wide Web Conference, pp. 137–157 (2000)Ceri, S., Fraternali, P., Acerbis, R., Bongio, A., Butti, S., Ciapessoni, F., Conserva, C., Elli, R., Greppi, C., Tagliasacchi, M., Toffetti, G.: Architectural issues and solutions in the development of data-intensive Web applications. In: Proceedings of the 1st Biennial Conference on Innovative Data Systems Research, Asilomar, CA (2003)Conte, T., Massollar, J., Mendes, E., Travassos, G.H.: Usability Evaluation Based on Web Design Perspectives. In: Proceedings of the International Symposium on Empirical Software Engineering and Measurement (ESEM 2007), pp. 146–155 (2007)Fernandez, A., Insfran, E., Abrahão, S.: Usability evaluation methods for the Web: a systematic mapping study. Information and Software Technology 53, 789–817 (2011)Fernandez, A., Abrahão, S., Insfran, E.: A Web usability evaluation process for model-driven Web development. In: Mouratidis, H., Rolland, C. (eds.) CAiSE 2011. LNCS, vol. 6741, pp. 108–122. Springer, Heidelberg (2011)Fernandez, A., Abrahão, S., Insfran, E., Matera, M.: Further Analysis on the Validation of a Usability Inspection Method for Model-Driven Web Development. In: 6th International Symposium on Empirical Software Engineering and Measurement (ESEM 2012), pp. 153–156 (2012)Fernandez, A., Abrahão, S., Insfran, E.: Empirical Validation of a Usability Inspection Method for Model-Driven Web Development. Journal of Systems and Software 86, 161–186 (2013)Fraternali, P., Matera, M., Maurino, A.: WQA: an XSL Framework for Analyzing the Quality of Web Applications. In: Proceedings of IWWOST 2002 - ECOOP 2002 Workshop, Malaga, Spain (2002)Hornbæk, K.: Dogmas in the assessment of usability evaluation methods. Behaviour & Information Technology 29(1), 97–111 (2010)Hwang, W., Salvendy, G.: Number of people required for usability evaluation: the 10±2 rule. Communications of the ACM 53(5), 130–113 (2010)International Organization for Standardization: ISO/IEC 25000, Software Engineering – Software Product Quality Requirements and Evaluation (SQuaRE) – Guide to SQuaRE (2005)Juristo, N., Moreno, A.M.: Basics of Software Engineering Experimentation. Kluwer Academic Publishers (2001)Juristo, N., Moreno, A., Sanchez-Segura, M.I.: Guidelines for eliciting usability functionalities. IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering 33(11), 744–758 (2007)Matera, M., Costabile, M.F., Garzotto, F., Paolini, P.: SUE inspection: an effective method for systematic usability evaluation of hypermedia. IEEE Transactions on Systems, Man, and Cybernetics, Part A 32(1), 93–103 (2002)Matera, M., Rizzo, F., Carughi, G.: Web Usability: Principles and Evaluation Methods. In: Web Engineering, pp. 143–180. Springer (2006)Maxwell, K.: Applied Statistics for Software Managers. Software Quality Institute Series. Prentice Hall (2002)Molina, F., Toval, A.: Integrating usability requirements that can be evaluated in design time into Model Driven Engineering of Web Information Systems. Advances in Engineering Software 40(12), 1306–1317 (2009)Moreno, N., Vallecillo, A.: Towards interoperable Web engineering methods. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technolog 59(7), 1073–1092 (2008)Neuwirth, C.M., Regli, S.H.: IEEE Internet Computing Special Issue on Usability and the Web 6(2) (2002)Nielsen, J.: Heuristic evaluation. In: Usability Inspection Methods. John Wiley & Sons, NY (1994)Offutt, J.: Quality attributes of Web software applications. IEEE Software: Special Issue on Software Engineering of Internet Software, 25–32 (2002)Panach, I., Condori, N., Valverde, F., Aquino, N., Pastor, O.: Understandability measurement in an early usability evaluation for MDD. In: International Symposium on Empirical Software Engineering (ESEM 2008), pp. 354–356 (2008)Webratio. Success stories, Online article, http://www.webratio.com/portal/content/en/success-storiesWohlin, C., Runeson, P., Host, M., Ohlsson, M.C., Regnell, B., Weslen, A.: Experimentation in Software Engineering - An Introduction. Kluwer (2000

Effective and Appropriate Use of Controlled Experimentation in Software Development Research

Although there is a large body of research and publication on software development, only a limited amount of this work includes empirical demonstration of its effectiveness. Yet, it is this empirical understanding which will help move software development from a craft to an engineering discipline. Of the empirical methods for research, controlled experiments are the most commonly thought of in scientific studies, and yet the least used to study software development. This thesis begins with a brief review of the different empirical methods commonly used to study software development. This review provides a quick introduction to each empirical method, compares the main advantages and weaknesses of each method, and provides a context for how controlled experimentation compares to other empirical methods for studying software development. Using empirical methods to study software development is not easy or straightforward. There are limitations which appear to be inherent in the nature of software and issues due to the improper understanding or application of empirical methods. These limitations and issues are identified, specifically for controlled experiments, and approaches for dealing with them are proposed. A controlled experiment was designed and conducted to demonstrate the method and explore the limitations and issues for empirical research in software development. This experiment and its results are presented. This example experiment demonstrates that conducting even a simple experiment in software development is challenging. Lessons learned from this experience are reported. Controlled experiments require that the researcher have a high degree of control over the environment where the experiment is carried out. This can be costly and difficult to achieve. This thesis concludes by discussing how controlled experiments can be used effectively in studies of software development

Defining and validating a multimodel approach for product architecture derivation and improvement

The final publication is available at Springer via http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-41533-3_24Software architectures are the key to achieving the non-functional requirements (NFRs) in any software project. In software product line (SPL) development, it is crucial to identify whether the NFRs for a specific product can be attained with the built-in architectural variation mechanisms of the product line architecture, or whether additional architectural transformations are required. This paper presents a multimodel approach for quality-driven product architecture derivation and improvement (QuaDAI). A controlled experiment is also presented with the objective of comparing the effectiveness, efficiency, perceived ease of use, intention to use and perceived usefulness with regard to participants using QuaDAI as opposed to the Architecture Tradeoff Analysis Method (ATAM). The results show that QuaDAI is more efficient and perceived as easier to use than ATAM, from the perspective of novice software architecture evaluators. However, the other variables were not found to be statistically significant. Further replications are needed to obtain more conclusive results.This research is supported by the MULTIPLE project (MICINN TIN2009-13838) and the Vali+D fellowship program (ACIF/2011/235).González Huerta, J.; Insfrán Pelozo, CE.; Abrahao Gonzales, SM. (2013). Defining and validating a multimodel approach for product architecture derivation and improvement. En Model-Driven Engineering Languages and Systems. Springer. 388-404. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-41533-3_24S388404Ali-Babar, M., Lago, P., Van Deursen, A.: Empirical research in software architecture: opportunities, challenges, and approaches. 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Conf. on Automated Software Engineering, New York, USA, pp. 469–472 (2007)Buschmann, F., Meunier, R., Rohnert, H., Sommerlad, P., Stal, M.: Pattern-Oriented software architecture, vol. 1: A System of Patterns. Wiley (1996)Cabello, M.E., Ramos, I., Gómez, A., Limón, R.: Baseline-Oriented Modeling: An MDA Approach Based on Software Product Lines for the Expert Systems Development. In: 1st Asia Conference on Intelligent Information and Database Systems, Vietnam (2009)Carifio, J., Perla, R.J.: Ten Common Misunderstandings, Misconceptions, Persistent Myths and Urban Legends about Likert Scales and Likert Response Formats and their Antidotes. Journal of Social Sciences 3(3), 106–116 (2007)Clements, P., Northrop, L.: Software Product Lines: Practices and Patterns. Addison-Wesley, Boston (2007)Czarnecki, K., Kim, C.H.: Cardinality-based feature modeling and constraints: A progress report. In: Int. Workshop on Software Factories, San Diego-CA (2005)Datorro, J.: Convex Optimization & Euclidean Distance Geometry. Meboo Publishing (2005)Davis, F.D.: Perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use and user acceptance of information technology. MIS Quarterly 13(3), 319–340 (1989)Douglass, B.P.: Real-Time Design Patterns: Robust Scalable Architecture for Real-Time Systems. Addison-Wesley, Boston (2002)Feiler, P.H., Gluch, D.P., Hudak, J.: The Architecture Analysis & Design Language (AADL): An Introduction. Tech. Report CMU/SEI-2006-TN-011. SEI, Carnegie Mellon University (2006)Gómez, A., Ramos, I.: Cardinality-based feature modeling and model-driven engineering: Fitting them together. In: 4th Int. Workshop on Variability Modeling of Software Intensive Systems, Linz, Austria (2010)Gonzalez-Huerta, J., Insfran, E., Abrahao, S.: A Multimodel for Integrating Quality Assessment in Model-Driven Engineering. In: 8th International Conference on the Quality of Information and Communications Technology (QUATIC 2012), Lisbon, Portugal, September 3-6 (2012)Gonzalez-Huerta, J., Insfran, E., Abrahao, S., McGregor, J.D.: Non-functional Requirements in Model-Driven Software Product Line Engineering. In: 4th Int. Workshop on Non-functional System Properties in Domain Specific Modeling Languages, Insbruck, Austria (2012)Guana, V., Correal, V.: Variability quality evaluation on component-based software product lines. In: 15th Int. Software Product Line Conference, Munich, Germany, vol. 2, pp. 19.1–19.8 (2011)Insfrán, E., Abrahão, S., González-Huerta, J., McGregor, J.D., Ramos, I.: A Multimodeling Approach for Quality-Driven Architecture Derivation. In: 21st Int. Conf. on Information Systems Development (ISD 2012), Prato, Italy (2012)ISO/IEC 25000:2005, Software Engineering. Software product Quality Requirements and Evaluation SQuaRE (2005)Kazman, R., Klein, M., Clements, P.: ATAM: Method for Architecture Evaluation (CMU/SEI-2000-TR-004, ADA382629). Software Engineering Institute, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh (2000), http://www.sei.cmu.edu/publications/documents/00.reports/00tr004.htmlKim, T., Ko, I., Kang, S., Lee, D.: Extending ATAM to assess product line architecture. In: 8th IEEE Int. Conference on Computer and Information Technology, Sydney, Australia, pp. 790–797 (2008)Kitchenham, B.A., Pfleeger, S.L., Hoaglin, D.C., Rosenber, J.: Preliminary Guidelines for Empirical Research in Software Engineering. IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering 28(8) (2002)Kruchten, P.B.: The Rational Unified Process: An Introduction. Addison-Wesley (1999)Martensson, F.: Software Architecture Quality Evaluation. Approaches in an Industrial Context. Ph. D. thesis, Blekinge Institute of Technology, Karlskrona, Sweden (2006)Maxwell, K.: Applied Statistics for Software Managers. Software Quality Institute Series. Prentice-Hall (2002)Olumofin, F.G., Mišic, V.B.: A holistic architecture assessment method for software product lines. Information and Software Technology 49, 309–323 (2007)Perovich, D., Rossel, P.O., Bastarrica, M.C.: Feature model to product architectures: Applying MDE to Software Product Lines. In: IEEE/IFIP & European Conference on Software Architecture, Helsinki, Findland, pp. 201–210 (2009)Robertson, S., Robertson, J.: Mastering the requirements process. ACM Press, New York (1999)Roos-Frantz, F., Benavides, D., Ruiz-Cortés, A., Heuer, A., Lauenroth, K.: Quality-aware analysis in product line engineering with the orthogonal variability model. Software Quality Journal (2011), doi:10.1007/s11219-011-9156-5Saaty, T.L.: The Analytical Hierarchical Process. McGraw- Hill, New York (1990)Taher, L., Khatib, H.E., Basha, R.: A framework and QoS matchmaking algorithm for dynamic web services selection. In: 2nd Int. Conference on Innovations in Information Technology, Dubai, UAE (2005)Wohlin, C., Runeson, P., Host, M., Ohlsson, M.C., Regnell, B., Weslen, A.: Experimentation in Software Engineering - An Introduction. Kluwer (2000

A comprehensive fractal approach in determination of the effective thermal conductivity of gas diffusion layers in polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cells

The challenges in the fuel cell industry is to produce the efficient thermal and water management for accurate determination of the effectiveness thermal conductivity of gas diffusion layers (GDL) used in polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cells (PEMFC‟s). This is one of the factors affecting the durability of a fuel cell and need to get a solution to minimize costs and optimize the use of electrodes and cells. The main objectives of this research focus on the capability of the fractal approach for estimation the effectiveness of thermal conductivity of gas diffusion layer. Moreover, on this research also to propose modified fractal equations in determination of the effective thermal conductivity of GDL in PEMFCs based on previous study. Other objectives in this study are demonstrated the thermal conductivity of GDL treated with PTFE contents by using through-plane thermal conductivity experiment method. The through-plane measurement (experiment method) has been used in estimating through-plane thermal conductivity of the GDL. Thermal resistance for GDL also has been investigated under compression pressure 0.1 MPa until 1.0 MPa. In fractal equation, the determination of tortuous and pore fractal dimension can be done by using Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM) method. Determination of effectiveness thermal conductivity using of fractal equation with slightly modified. In findings, it was found that fractal equation have been modified and measured on the GDL parameter characteristics. It was shown that the value of the effectiveness thermal conductivity of the sample using fractal approach is in good agreement with the experimental value. Finally, all the effective thermal conductivity measured by experimental and fractal approach have been determined with the variant temperature and compression pressure to show the validation result between of this two methods

Considerations about Continuous Experimentation for Resource-Constrained Platforms in Self-Driving Vehicles

Autonomous vehicles are slowly becoming reality thanks to the efforts of many academic and industrial organizations. Due to the complexity of the software powering these systems and the dynamicity of the development processes, an architectural solution capable of supporting long-term evolution and maintenance is required. Continuous Experimentation (CE) is an already increasingly adopted practice in software-intensive web-based software systems to steadily improve them over time. CE allows organizations to steer the development efforts by basing decisions on data collected about the system in its field of application. Despite the advantages of Continuous Experimentation, this practice is only rarely adopted in cyber-physical systems and in the automotive domain. Reasons for this include the strict safety constraints and the computational capabilities needed from the target systems. In this work, a concept for using Continuous Experimentation for resource-constrained platforms like a self-driving vehicle is outlined.Comment: Copyright 2017 Springer. Paper submitted and accepted at the 11th European Conference on Software Architecture. 8 pages, 1 figure. Published in Lecture Notes in Computer Science vol 10475 (Springer), https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-319-65831-5_

What influences the speed of prototyping? An empirical investigation of twenty software startups

It is essential for startups to quickly experiment business ideas by building tangible prototypes and collecting user feedback on them. As prototyping is an inevitable part of learning for early stage software startups, how fast startups can learn depends on how fast they can prototype. Despite of the importance, there is a lack of research about prototyping in software startups. In this study, we aimed at understanding what are factors influencing different types of prototyping activities. We conducted a multiple case study on twenty European software startups. The results are two folds, firstly we propose a prototype-centric learning model in early stage software startups. Secondly, we identify factors occur as barriers but also facilitators for prototyping in early stage software startups. The factors are grouped into (1) artifacts, (2) team competence, (3) collaboration, (4) customer and (5) process dimensions. To speed up a startups progress at the early stage, it is important to incorporate the learning objective into a well-defined collaborative approach of prototypingComment: This is the author's version of the work. Copyright owner's version can be accessed at doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-57633-6_2, XP2017, Cologne, German

Approach to Identify Internal Best Practices in a Software Organization.

Current approaches to software process improvements (SPI) in software organizations is based on identifying gaps by comparing the way organizations work with respect to practices contained in the reference models. Later, these gaps will be targeted for establishing software process improvements. This paper presents an approach for identifying best practices within the organization. This is considered a key element in order to compare the way software organizations work with the reference models. After that, these practices will be complemented with practices contained in these models depending on the organization's business goals