Software Patents: What One-Click Buy and Safe Air Travel Have in Common

Have you ever sat in an airplane, typing on your laptop, when the darn thing crashes for the one-millionth time? Have you ever then thought about how the airplane you are sitting in is controlled by software, too--the technical term being fly by wire --and then started sweating uncontrollably? Software controls not only air traffic but plenty of other safety-critical technologies: the tightrope walk of controlling the chain reaction of radioactive elements in nuclear power plants; the navigation and activation of missiles;3 the moves and cutting-depth of a surgical laser when correcting eye-sights; the list goes on... With such reliance on software, malfunction due to errors in the program code becomes unacceptable. Software patents help heighten the standard by supporting the re-use of the code of established and tested systems

Transformation of the Software Components and Web Services Market

The Service Oriented Computing paradigm, with as its main manifestation web-service technology, holds high promises, but exploits its full potential only when third-party web-services are traded in a service market to enable effective development of net-enhanced organizations and business networks. After the introduction of software source code libraries and the rise of Software Component Markets (SCMs) since 1999, Web Service Markets (WSM) represent the third wave in the trade of reusable software components. However, very little is known about the current status, structure and trends within the WSM. We present a longitudinal study of the structure of the SCM in 1999, 2000, and 2006 and a study of the WSM in 2006. The SCM has grown into a large, polluted, and un-transparent market of around 30,000 software components, offered by 28 producers, 28 catalogues, and 8 intermediaries. Our study shows that the WSM is emerging and in the early stage of development in 2006. SCM and WSM still have a long way to become transparent and effective mechanisms for organizations to obtain powerful, re-usable, and interoperable components for business networking

MVICS: a repository and search tool towards holistic semantic-based precise component selection.

Driven by the continuous expansions of software applications and the increases in component varieties and sizes, the so-called component mismatch problem has become a more severe hurdle for component selection and integration. Although many component repositories and search tools have been proposed, so far there is no satisfactory solution which simultaneously achieves the following goals: automated, semantic-based, and precise. This paper presents a novel component repository and associated search tool which implements holistic semantic-based and adaptation-aware component specification and retrieval. The repository and tool is based on a Multiple-View and Interrelated Component Specification ontology model (MVICS), which has a smooth integration with domain related software system ontologies. The MVICS provides a formally defined and ontology-based architecture to specify components automatically in a spectrum of perspectives. The integration enhances the function and application scope of the MVICS model by bringing domain semantics into component specification and retrieval. The repository and search tool contributes to the current state of the art with four unique features: ontology-based component specification mechanism, semantic-based component retrieval method, adaptive component matching, and a comprehensive result component profile. The repository and tool has been widely tested and evaluated via its online version and follow-on survey reports, which concluded that they are effective for avoiding the component mismatch problem and is promising for industrial use

MVICS: a repository and search tool towards holistic semantic-based precise component selection.

Driven by the continuous expansions of software applications and the increases in component varieties and sizes, the so-called component mismatch problem has become a more severe hurdle for component selection and integration. Although many component repositories and search tools have been proposed, so far there is no satisfactory solution which simultaneously achieves the following goals: automated, semantic-based, and precise. This paper presents a novel component repository and associated search tool which implements holistic semantic-based and adaptation-aware component specification and retrieval. The repository and tool is based on a Multiple-View and Interrelated Component Specification ontology model (MVICS), which has a smooth integration with domain related software system ontologies. The MVICS provides a formally defined and ontology-based architecture to specify components automatically in a spectrum of perspectives. The integration enhances the function and application scope of the MVICS model by bringing domain semantics into component specification and retrieval. The repository and search tool contributes to the current state of the art with four unique features: ontology-based component specification mechanism, semantic-based component retrieval method, adaptive component matching, and a comprehensive result component profile. The repository and tool has been widely tested and evaluated via its online version and follow-on survey reports, which concluded that they are effective for avoiding the component mismatch problem and is promising for industrial use

A holistic semantic based approach to component specification and retrieval

Component-Based Development (CBD) has been broadly used in software development as it enhances the productivity and reduces the costs and risks involved in systems development. It has become a well-understood and widely used technology for developing not only large enterprise applications, but also a whole spectrum of software applications, as it offers fast and flexible development. However, driven by the continuous expansions of software applications, the increase in component varieties and sizes and the evolution from local to global component repositories, the so-called component mismatch problem has become an even more severe hurdle for component specification and retrieval. This problem not only prevents CBD from reaching its full potential, but also hinders the acceptance of many existing component repository. To overcome the above problem, existing approaches engaged a variety of technologies to support better component specification and retrieval. The existing approaches range from the early syntax-based (traditional) approaches to the recent semantic-based approaches. Although the different technologies are proposed to achieve accurate description of the component specification and/or user query in their specification and retrieval, the existing semantic-based approaches still fail to achieve the following goals which are desired for present component reuse: precise, automated, semantic-based and domain capable. This thesis proposes an approach, namely MVICS-based approach, aimed at achieving holistic, semantic-based and adaptation-aware component specification and retrieval. As the foundation, a Multiple-Viewed and Interrelated Component Specification ontology model (MVICS) is first developed for component specification and repository building. The MVICS model provides an ontology-based architecture to specify components from a range of perspectives; it integrates the knowledge of Component-Based Software Engineering (CBSE), and supports ontology evolution to reflect the continuous developments in CBD and components. A formal definition of the MVICS model is presented, which ensures the rigorousness of the model and supports the high level of automation of the retrieval. Furthermore, the MVICS model has a smooth mechanism to integrate with domain related software system ontology. Such integration enhances the function and application scope of the MVICS model by bringing more domain semantics into component specification and retrieval. Another improved feature of the proposed approach is that the effect of possible component adaptation is extended to the related components. Finally a comprehensive profile of the result components shows the search results to the user from a summary to satisfied and unsatisfied discrepancy details. The above features of the approach are well integrated, which enables a holistic view in semantic-based component specification and retrieval. A prototype tool was developed to exert the power of the MVICS model in expressing semantics and process automation in component specification and retrieval. The tool implements the complete process of component search. Three case studies have been undertaken to illustrate and evaluate the usability and correctness of the approach, in terms of supporting accurate component specification and retrieval, seamless linkage with a domain ontology, adaptive component suggestion and comprehensive result component profile. A conclusion is drawn based on an analysis of the feedback from the case studies, which shows that the proposed approach can be deployed in real life industrial development. The benefits of MVICS include not only the improvement of the component search precision and recall, reducing the development time and the repository maintenance effort, but also the decrease of human intervention on CBD.EThOS - Electronic Theses Online ServiceGBUnited Kingdo

Exploiting the architectural characteristics of software components to improve software reuse

PhD ThesisSoftware development is a costly process for all but the most trivial systems. One of the commonly known ways of minimizing development costs is to re-use previously built software components. However, a significant problem that source-code re-users encounter is the difficulty of finding components that not only provide the functionality they need but also conform to the architecture of the system they are building. To facilitate finding reusable components there is a need to establish an appropriate mechanism for matching the key architectural characteristics of the available source-code components against the characteristics of the system being built. This research develops a precise characterization of the architectural characteristics of source-code components, and investigates a new way to describe how appropriate components for re-use can be identified and categorized.Umm Al- Qura University

A holistic semantic based approach to component specification and retrieval

Component-Based Development (CBD) has been broadly used in software development as it enhances the productivity and reduces the costs and risks involved in systems development. It has become a well-understood and widely used technology for developing not only large enterprise applications, but also a whole spectrum of software applications, as it offers fast and flexible development. However, driven by the continuous expansions of software applications, the increase in component varieties and sizes and the evolution from local to global component repositories, the so-called component mismatch problem has become an even more severe hurdle for component specification and retrieval. This problem not only prevents CBD from reaching its full potential, but also hinders the acceptance of many existing component repository. To overcome the above problem, existing approaches engaged a variety of technologies to support better component specification and retrieval. The existing approaches range from the early syntax-based (traditional) approaches to the recent semantic-based approaches. Although the different technologies are proposed to achieve accurate description of the component specification and/or user query in their specification and retrieval, the existing semantic-based approaches still fail to achieve the following goals which are desired for present component reuse: precise, automated, semantic-based and domain capable.This thesis proposes an approach, namely MVICS-based approach, aimed at achieving holistic, semantic-based and adaptation-aware component specification and retrieval. As the foundation, a Multiple-Viewed and Interrelated Component Specification ontology model (MVICS) is first developed for component specification and repository building. The MVICS model provides an ontology-based architecture to specify components from a range of perspectives; it integrates the knowledge of Component-Based Software Engineering (CBSE), and supports ontology evolution to reflect the continuous developments in CBD and components. A formal definition of the MVICS model is presented, which ensures the rigorousness of the model and supports the high level of automation of the retrieval. Furthermore, the MVICS model has a smooth mechanism to integrate with domain related software system ontology. Such integration enhances the function and application scope of the MVICS model by bringing more domain semantics into component specification and retrieval. Another improved feature of the proposed approach is that the effect of possible component adaptation is extended to the related components. Finally a comprehensive profile of the result components shows the search results to the user from a summary to satisfied and unsatisfied discrepancy details. The above features of the approach are well integrated, which enables a holistic view in semantic-based component specification and retrieval.A prototype tool was developed to exert the power of the MVICS model in expressing semantics and process automation in component specification and retrieval. The tool implements the complete process of component search. Three case studies have been undertaken to illustrate and evaluate the usability and correctness of the approach, in terms of supporting accurate component specification and retrieval, seamless linkage with a domain ontology, adaptive component suggestion and comprehensive result component profile.A conclusion is drawn based on an analysis of the feedback from the case studies, which shows that the proposed approach can be deployed in real life industrial development. The benefits of MVICS include not only the improvement of the component search precision and recall, reducing the development time and the repository maintenance effort, but also the decrease of human intervention on CBD