It is known that the support provided by MATLAB for module decomposition is
limited. Such limitations give rise to code symptoms, which can be explored for the
development of techniques for the detection of concerns, namely unmodularised concerns.
Recent work in the area of concern detection in MATLAB systems identified several
recurring code patterns that can be associated to the presence of specific concerns. Some
of the concerns detected proved to be unmodularised: they cut across the MATLAB
system’s modular decomposition.
The techniques already developed for detecting unmodularised concerns in MATLAB
systems still lack precision and accuracy. As proposed in previous work, the techniques
and tools for pinpointing and representing concern-detection patterns need maturing.
This thesis contributes with a more accurate structure for representing MATLAB code
bases in an intelligent repository for MATLAB code, developed prior to this work. It
perfects the structure representing MATLAB code on which the repository is based, by refining
the notion of code block, and collects code patterns found in previous publications
aggregating them into a catalogue. Subsequently, a preliminary study is made on the
application of codes of blocks for the detection of concerns, validating previous concern
related patterns and evaluate the existence of new ones
