Exploring Maintainability Assurance Research for Service- and Microservice-Based Systems: Directions and Differences

To ensure sustainable software maintenance and evolution, a diverse set of activities and concepts like metrics, change impact analysis, or antipattern detection can be used. Special maintainability assurance techniques have been proposed for service- and microservice-based systems, but it is difficult to get a comprehensive overview of this publication landscape. We therefore conducted a systematic literature review (SLR) to collect and categorize maintainability assurance approaches for service-oriented architecture (SOA) and microservices. Our search strategy led to the selection of 223 primary studies from 2007 to 2018 which we categorized with a threefold taxonomy: a) architectural (SOA, microservices, both), b) methodical (method or contribution of the study), and c) thematic (maintainability assurance subfield). We discuss the distribution among these categories and present different research directions as well as exemplary studies per thematic category. The primary finding of our SLR is that, while very few approaches have been suggested for microservices so far (24 of 223, ?11%), we identified several thematic categories where existing SOA techniques could be adapted for the maintainability assurance of microservices

Detection of microservice smells through static analysis

A arquitetura de microsserviços é um modelo arquitetural promissor na área de software, atraindo desenvolvedores e empresas para os seus princípios convincentes. As suas vantagens residem no potencial para melhorar a escalabilidade, a flexibilidade e a agilidade, alinhando se com as exigências em constante evolução da era digital. No entanto, navegar entre as complexidades dos microsserviços pode ser uma tarefa desafiante, especialmente à medida que este campo continua a evoluir. Um dos principais desafios advém da complexidade inerente aos microsserviços, em que o seu grande número e interdependências podem introduzir novas camadas de complexidade. Além disso, a rápida expansão dos microsserviços, juntamente com a necessidade de aproveitar as suas vantagens de forma eficaz, exige uma compreensão mais profunda das potenciais ameaças e problemas que podem surgir. Para tirar verdadeiramente partido das vantagens dos microsserviços, é essencial enfrentar estes desafios e garantir que o desenvolvimento e a adoção de microsserviços sejam bem-sucedidos. O presente documento pretende explorar a área dos smells da arquitetura de microsserviços que desempenham um papel tão importante na dívida técnica dirigida à área dos microsserviços. Embarca numa exploração de investigação abrangente, explorando o domínio dos smells de microsserviços. Esta investigação serve como base para melhorar um catálogo de smells de microsserviços. Esta investigação abrangente obtém dados de duas fontes primárias: systematic mapping study e um questionário a profissionais da área. Este último envolveu 31 profissionais experientes com uma experiência substancial no domínio dos microsserviços. Além disso, são descritos o desenvolvimento e o aperfeiçoamento de uma ferramenta especificamente concebida para identificar e resolver problemas relacionados com os microsserviços. Esta ferramenta destina-se a melhorar o desempenho dos programadores durante o desenvolvimento e a implementação da arquitetura de microsserviços. Por último, o documento inclui uma avaliação do desempenho da ferramenta. Trata-se de uma análise comparativa efetuada antes e depois das melhorias introduzidas na ferramenta. A eficácia da ferramenta será avaliada utilizando o mesmo benchmarking de microsserviços utilizado anteriormente, para além de outro benchmarking para garantir uma avaliação abrangente.The microservices architecture stands as a beacon of promise in the software landscape, drawing developers and companies towards its compelling principles. Its appeal lies in the potential for improved scalability, flexibility, and agility, aligning with the ever-evolving demands of the digital age. However, navigating the intricacies of microservices can be a challenging task, especially as this field continues to evolve. A key challenge arises from the inherent complexity of microservices, where their sheer number and interdependencies can introduce new layers of intricacy. Furthermore, the rapid expansion of microservices, coupled with the need to harness their advantages effectively, demands a deeper understanding of the potential pitfalls and issues that may emerge. To truly unlock the benefits of microservices, it is essential to address these challenges head-on and ensure a successful journey in the world of microservices development and adoption. The present document intends to explore the area of microservice architecture smells that play such an important role in the technical debt directed to the area of microservices. It embarks on a comprehensive research exploration, delving into the realm of microservice smells. This research serves as the cornerstone for enhancing a microservice smell catalogue. This comprehensive research draws data from two primary sources: a systematic mapping research and an industry survey. The latter involves 31 seasoned professionals with substantial experience in the field of microservices. Moreover, the development and enhancement of a tool specifically designed to identify and address issues related to microservices is described. This tool is aimed at improving developers' performance throughout the development and implementation of microservices architecture. Finally, the document includes an evaluation of the tool's performance. This involves a comparative analysis conducted before and after the tool's enhancements. The tool's effectiveness will be assessed using the same microservice benchmarking as previously employed, in addition to another benchmark to ensure a comprehensive evaluation

Microservice Architectures for Advanced Driver Assistance Systems: A Case-Study

The technological advancements of recent years have steadily increased the complexity of vehicle-internal software systems, and the ongoing development towards autonomous driving will further aggravate this situation. This is leading to a level of complexity that is pushing the limits of existing vehicle software architectures and system designs. By changing the software structure to a service-based architecture, companies in other domains successfully managed the rising complexity and created a more agile and future-oriented development process. This paper presents a case-study investigating the feasibility and possible effects of changing the software architecture for a complex driver assistance function to a microservice architecture. The complete procedure is described, starting with the description of the software-environment and the corresponding requirements, followed by the implementation, and the final testing. In addition, this paper provides a high-level evaluation of the microservice architecture for the automotive use-case. The results show that microservice architectures can reduce complexity and time-consuming process steps and makes the automotive software systems prepared for upcoming challenges as long as the principles of microservice architectures are carefully followed

Road to Microservices

This document intends to elucidate the complexity of microservices decomposition and this its inherent process of implementation. Developments in technology and design, achieving higher performance, reliability, or lowering costs are valid reasons to consider controlling the product’s quality by guaranteeing its conformance with established characteristics and standards. Control is made possible by adding quality control, inspection routines, and trend analysis to a manufacturing process. These techniques are established in the Quality field academically and business-wise. Repeat Part Management (RPM) is software that allows users to apply these techniques efficiently and has brought value to the company. However, RPM has been growing, and issues have emerged due to customer needs - accumulated technical debt. These ever-growing modifications are common through different business areas, and architectures’ research evolution has accompanied them. This demand for highly modifiable, rapid development, and independent systems has resulted in the adoption of microservices. There is a concern for existing systems for decomposition due to the characteristics of microservices, which encourages approach/technique research. This architecture promotes legacy system analysis to map current functionalities and dependencies between components. Furthermore, critical concepts in a microservices architecture are researched and implemented in a new system that encompasses Repeat Part Management’s functionalities. This thesis explores the microservices’ architecture evolution with an already defined mature domain in quality assessment.Este documento pretende especificar a complexidade do processo de decomposição em microsserviços e do seu processo de implementação. Avanços na tecnologia e design, alcançar melhor performance, ou a confiabilidade do produto, ou diminuir custos são justificações válidas para considerar controlar a qualidade do produto e, inerentemente, garantir a sua conformidade com as características previamente definidas e com padrões da indústria. É possível garantir controlo sob os produtos ao acrescentar, ao processo produtivo, métodos de controlo de qualidade, rotinas de inspeção e análise de tendências (de desvio). Estas técnicas estão bem estabelecidas academicamente e, de um ponto de vista do mercado, na área da Qualidade e garantia da qualidade. O Repeat Part Management (RPM) é um software que permite aos seus utilizadores a utilização eficiente destas técnicas de qualidade, o que resulta numa adição de valor para a empresa. Porém, devido às crescentes necessidades dos clientes, alguns problemas têm sido identificados - relacionados com o conceito de acumulação de technical debt. Esta crescente necessidade de alteração é comum em diversas áreas de negócio, e a investigação de soluções arquiteturais tem acompanhado esta pesquisa. Esta solução arquitetura pode ser caracterizada pela facilidade de sistemas facilmente modificáveis, pelo rápido desenvolvimento e implementação, e pela independência dos serviços decompostos. Aquando de uma migração para microsserviços num sistema maturo, existe uma maior preocupação na decomposição da aplicação e definição dos serviços dada a característica dos microsserviços, o que incentiva a uma pesquisa detalhada sobre as técnicas de decomposição. Pela mesma razão, esta arquitetura incentiva ao mapeamento e documentação das dependências entre serviços e componentes e o estudo da aplicação legacy. Para além disto, estes conceitos, e a sua implementação devem ser planeados, justificados e documentados, o que explica a complexidade do processo de migração e implementação, que deve ter em consideração as funcionalidades existentes no Repeat Part Management. Dessa forma, esta tese explora a implementação desta arquitetura numa aplicação matura na área de Garantia de Qualidade

On the Modularization of ExplorViz towards Collaborative Open Source Development

Software systems evolve over their lifetime. Changing conditions such as requirements or customer requests make it inevitable for developers to perform adjustments to the underlying code base. Especially in the context of open source software where everybody can contribute, demands can change over time and new user groups may be addressed. In particular, research software is often not structured with a maintainable and extensible architecture. In combination with obsolescent technologies, this is a challenging task for developers, especially, when students are involved. In this paper, we report on the modularization process and architecture of our open source research project ExplorViz towards a microservice architecture, which facilitates a collaborative development process for both researchers and students. We describe the modularization measures and present how we solved occurring issues and enhanced our development process. Afterwards, we illustrate our modularization approach with our modernized, extensible software system architecture and highlight the improved collaborative development process. Finally, we present a proof-of-concept implementation featuring several developed extensions in terms of architecture and extensibility