Maintaining software through intentional source-code views

Maintaining the source code of large software systems is hard. One underlying cause is that existing modularisation mechanisms are inadequate to handle crosscutting concerns. We propose intentional source-code views as an intuitive and lightweight means of modelling such concerns. They increase our ability to understand, modularise and browse the source code by grouping together source-code entities that address the same concern. They facilitate software development and evolution, because alternative descriptions of the same intentional view can be checked for consistency and relations among intentional views can be defined and verified. Finally, they enable us to specify knowledge developers have about source code that is not captured by traditional program documentation mechanisms. Our intentional view model is implemented in a logic metaprogramming language that can reason about and manipulate object-oriented source code directly. The proposed model has been validated on the evolution of a medium-sized object-oriented application in Smalltalk, and a prototype tool has been implemented

Applying aspect-oriented programming to music computing

Computer programs for the composition, performance and analysis of music generally involve the tangled interaction of many dimensions of musical and extra-musical concern. In this paper we introduce the concepts of Aspect-Oriented Programming (AOP) to Music Computing and argue that AOP and related techniques and technologies form an appropriate solution to the separation and composition of such concerns. We motivate our argument with simple examples from the musical domain, but argue that the underlying principles may be applied to a wide and expressive range of musical application

Face-off: AOP+LMP vs. legacy software

Our presentation relates on a first attempt to see if aspect-oriented programming (AOP) can really help with the revitalisation of legacy business software. By means of four realistic case studies covering reverse engineering, restructuring and integration, we discuss the applicability of the aspect-oriented paradigm in the context of two major programming languages for such environments: Cobol and C. For each case, we consider both advantages and disadvantages

Package Evolvability and its Relationship with Refactoring

In this paper, we address a set of research questions investigating trends in changes to an open-source system (OSS). An interesting âpeak and troughâ effect trend was found to exist in the system studied, suggesting that developer activity comprises of a set of high and low periods. Trends in overall changes applied to the system were complemented with empirical evidence in refactoring data for the same system; this showed a similar peak and trough effect but at different versions of the same system. This result suggests a contrasting motivation between regular maintenance practice and that of refactoring. Our analysis of high-level package trends informed some interesting cross-comparisons with refactoring practice, and some insights into why refactoring might be applied after a burst of regular change activity, rather than consistently. We use data extracted from seven Java OSS as a basis for our refactoring analysis

Leveraging Program Comprehension with Concern-oriented Source Code Projections

In this paper we briefly introduce our concern-oriented source code projections that enable looking at same source code in multiple different ways. The objective of this paper is to discuss projection creation process in detail and to explain benefits of using projections to aid program comprehension. We achieve this objective by showing a case study that illustrates using projections on examples. Presented case study was done using our prototypical tool that is implemented as a plugin for NetBeans IDE. We briefly introduce the tool and present an experiment that we have conducted with a group of students at our university. The results of the experiment indicate that projections have positive effect on program comprehension

Open Programming Language Interpreters

Context: This paper presents the concept of open programming language interpreters and the implementation of a framework-level metaobject protocol (MOP) to support them. Inquiry: We address the problem of dynamic interpreter adaptation to tailor the interpreter's behavior on the task to be solved and to introduce new features to fulfill unforeseen requirements. Many languages provide a MOP that to some degree supports reflection. However, MOPs are typically language-specific, their reflective functionality is often restricted, and the adaptation and application logic are often mixed which hardens the understanding and maintenance of the source code. Our system overcomes these limitations. Approach: We designed and implemented a system to support open programming language interpreters. The prototype implementation is integrated in the Neverlang framework. The system exposes the structure, behavior and the runtime state of any Neverlang-based interpreter with the ability to modify it. Knowledge: Our system provides a complete control over interpreter's structure, behavior and its runtime state. The approach is applicable to every Neverlang-based interpreter. Adaptation code can potentially be reused across different language implementations. Grounding: Having a prototype implementation we focused on feasibility evaluation. The paper shows that our approach well addresses problems commonly found in the research literature. We have a demonstrative video and examples that illustrate our approach on dynamic software adaptation, aspect-oriented programming, debugging and context-aware interpreters. Importance: To our knowledge, our paper presents the first reflective approach targeting a general framework for language development. Our system provides full reflective support for free to any Neverlang-based interpreter. We are not aware of any prior application of open implementations to programming language interpreters in the sense defined in this paper. Rather than substituting other approaches, we believe our system can be used as a complementary technique in situations where other approaches present serious limitations

Towards a Taxonomy of Aspect-Oriented Programming.

As programs continue to increase in size, it has become increasingly difficult to separate concerns into well localized modules, which leads to code tangling- crosscutting code spread throughout several modules. Thus, Aspect-Oriented Programming (AOP) offers a solution to creating modules with little or no crosscutting concerns. AOP presents the notion of aspects, and demonstrates how crosscutting concerns can be taken out of modules and placed into a centralized location. In this paper, a taxonomy of aspect-oriented programming, as well as a basic overview and introduction of AOP, will be presented in order to assist future researchers in getting started on additional research on the topic. To form the taxonomy, over four-hundred research articles were organized into fifteen different primary categories coupled with sub-categories, which shows where some of the past research has been focused. In addition, trends of the research were evaluated and paths for future exploration are suggested