基于软件产品线的需求分析研究

软件产品线方法是一种面向特定领域的、大规模、大粒度的软件复用技术.在软件产品线的开发过程中,产品线需求分析是软件产品线开发的关键活动之一,软件产品线需求分析奠定了产品线构架的基础.通过分析软件产品线开发过程和软件产品线需求分析的特点,阐述了软件产品线需求分析方法以及软件产品线需求分析的实践风险.以领域分析和建模为切入点,对软件产品线的领域分析、需求建模和用例建模等关键方法和技术进行了重点的研究.     

基于UML用例图的软件产品线需求建模方法

软件产品线方法是一种面向特定领域的、大规模、大粒度的软件复用技术。明确建模和描述软件产品线需求是软件产品线开发的关键问题之一。而传统的UML用例图等方法不足以完整描述产品线需求,特别是其变化性。通过分析软件产品线开发过程和软件产品线需求建模的特殊性,采用扩展UML用例图标签的方法,实现对软件产品线需求的明确描述。以网络图书销售软件产品线为例,进行具体说明。     

一种适用于软件产品线的特征模型

针对传统的特征模型中存在的对软件产品线可变性需求表达不准确、缺乏特征描述方法的问题,在FODA等方法的研究基础上,从特征模型的层次分解、特征间依赖关系、变化性表示方法等方面进行描绘,提出一种适用于软件产品线的特征模型和特征描述方法．该特征模型能够帮助产品设计人员和开发人员正确理解产品需求,也是为后续实现软件产品线自动化生产打下基础．     

产品线成本模型的比较与分析

为给软件产品线决策者应用软件产品线模型提供理论上的参考,综合分析比较了近年来的20种软件产品线模型,在对软件产品线模型的投资循环、重用方式、货币时间价值、经济函数、成本因子和重用成本等方面因素进行细致分析的基础上提出了软件产品线模型的比较框架,在该框架内着重分析了其中5种典型的软件产品线模型,对应用软件产品线开发方式的成本估算和投资分析做了细致分析,并对当前软件产品线模型时存在的问题和发展方向进行了探讨.     

产品线可变性的需求方法研究

软件产品线领域需求记录了不同软件产品的共性和可变性。在现有需求过程框架下,对产品线需求获取方法与需求分析方法进行了研究,完善了产品线需求可变性的管控机制。以原子需求为视点,提出了利用需求场景获取产品线领域需求的方法;通过原子需求构建的产品需求矩阵与用例需求矩阵,分析得出需求资源的可变性关系;通过可变性关系的形式化描述,建立产品线可变性用例模型。     

基于特征切片的软件产品线模型检测

特征模型是一种描述软件产品线中共性和可变性特征的通用形式。特征模型象征着所有可能的应用程序配置空间,是实现个性化产品定制的基础。随着软件产品线的规模和复杂程度的增加,如何有效支持以用户需求为基础以及根据特定需求和利益相关者的目标进行个性定制开发是亟待解决的实际问题。提出一种根据用户需求对特征模型进行切片,进一步结合三值逻辑对行为模型进行抽象,最后利用模型检测技术对软件产品线进行验证的方法。实验结果证实了该方法的有效性。     

基于χChek的软件产品线多值模型检测方法

软件产品线保持产品个性化的同时提高了公共部分的复用。但软件产品线中包含的不确定信息,给产品带来了潜在风险。形式化验证技术逐步应用于软件产品线验证。但是传统的布尔逻辑模型不能很好地描述软件产品线的不确定性和不一致性。本文结合多值模型检测器χChek,通过基于动作的模型描述方法,对软件产品线进行描述,然后转换成为χChek规定的模型格式,同时提供多值逻辑描述。最后采用计算树逻辑描述产品线属性,使用χChek进行验证。     

基于产品线N-生命周期模型的集成化软件工程环境研究

为实现软件的工业化生产,我们对日渐成熟的软件产品线体系结构、构件技术和产品线开发方法进行了分析和研究,并借鉴现代工业生产体系和自动化生产方式,提出了基于产品线体系结构的软件工程过程模型--N-生命周期模型。以此模型为基础,提出了基于产品线开发过程模型的集成化软件工程环境模型和构架,并对此环境模型和构架的实实现进行了系统的理论、技术和配置研究。文中的研究思想和成果对于基于产品线的集成化软件工程环境研究具有一定的参考和借鉴作用。     

基于模型对比和组合的软件产品线领域需求建模

软件产品线作为系统化的软件复用方式,可以提高软件的开发效率和质量.软件产品线变化性建模是软件产品线的关键技术,通过建立变化性模型以记录软件产品线成员产品的共性和变化性.目前的软件产品线变化性建模方法大都通过领域专家进行分析建立,这种方法过度依赖于领域专家的分析能力,在系统规模较小的情况下,变化性分析比较容易,但是如果系统规模变大,则系统的规模对于变化性分析的影响会越来越大.文中提出一种半自动的软件产品线领域需求建模方法,基于关注点分离的思路,利用特征模型表示软件产品线中系列产品的不同方面的特征信息,通过特征模型的对比和组合实现领域需求模型的构建.为有效地实现特征模型对比与组合,文中提出一种基于标记和结构的特征模型对比方法,同时,文中实现了基于约束的特征模型组合.基于公开的特征模型,文中对提出的方法进行了验证,实验结果表明,文中提出的领域需求建模方法能够在一定准确率的情况下有效地实现领域需求模型的构建.     

通用的软件产品线领域与应用特征模型演化同步框架

软件产品线领域特征模型和应用特征模型都会发生独立的演化,在产品线的整体演化过程中必须使其始终保持一致,然而,分别为基于不同描述方式的特征模型创建同步设施往往费时、容易出错。因此,提出一个通用的软件产品线领域与应用特征模型的演化同步框架,该框架提供一套统一的特征模型元模型描述方式,并且基于该元模型提出了演化同步规则。 不同的软件产品线开发组织使用该框架时仅需定义特定的特征描述与通用描述方式之间的转换。最后,通过一个实例对框架的可用性进行了验证。     

Managing requirements specifications for product lines - An approach and industry case study

Software product line development has emerged as a leading approach for software reuse. This paper describes an approach to manage natural-language requirements specifications in a software product line context. Variability in such product line specifications is modeled and managed using a feature model. The proposed approach has been introduced in the Swedish defense industry. We present a multiple-case study covering two different product lines with in total eight product instances. These were compared to experiences from previous projects in the organization employing clone-and-own reuse. We conclude that the proposed product line approach performs better than clone-and-own reuse of requirements specifications in this particular industrial context.     

The impact of software evolution and reuse on software quality

This paper presents a case study of a software project in the maintenance phase. The case study was based on a sample of modules, representing about 1.3 million lines of code, from a very large telecommunications system. Software quality models were developed to predict the number of faults expected from the coding through operations phases. Since modules from the prior release were often reused to develop a new release, one model incorporated reuse data as additional independent variables. We compare this model's performance to a similar model without reuse data.Software quality models often have product metrics as the only input data for predicting quality. There is an implicit assumption that all the modules have had a similar development history, so that product attributes are the primary drivers of different quality levels. Reuse of software as components and software evolution do not fit this assumption very well, and consequently, traditional models for such environments may not have adequate accuracy. Focusing on the software maintenance phase, this study demonstrated that reuse data can significantly improve the predictive accuracy of software quality models.     

Retrieving reusable components with variation points from software product lines

Reusing software through software product lines has been recognized as useful. To improve reuse efficiency, retrieving proper systems or subsystems from software product lines for reuse is an important issue. This paper proposes a technique to retrieve reusable software systems/subsystems from software product lines.     

Effective development of automation systems through domain-specific modeling in a small enterprise context

High development and maintenance costs and a high error rate are the major problems in the development of automation systems, which are mainly caused by bad communication and inefficient reuse methods. To overcome these problems, we propose a more systematic reuse approach. Though systematic reuse approaches such as software product lines are appealing, they tend to involve rather burdensome development and management processes. This paper focuses on small enterprises. Since such companies are often unable to perform a “big bang” adoption of the software product line, we suggest an incremental, more lightweight process to transition from single-system development to software product line development. Besides the components of the transition process, this paper discusses tool selection, DSL technology, stakeholder communication support, and business considerations. Although based on problems from the automation system domain, we believe the approach may be general enough to be applicable in other domains as well. The approach has proven successful in two case studies. First, we applied it to a research project for the automation of a logistics lab model, and in the second case (a real-life industry case), we investigated the approaches suitability for fish farm automation systems. Several metrics were collected throughout the evolution of each case, and this paper presents the data for single system development, clone&own and software product line development. The results and observable effects are compared, discussed, and finally summarized in a list of lessons learned.     

Automating the product derivation process of multi-agent systems product lines

Agent-oriented software engineering and software product lines are two promising software engineering techniques. Recent research work has been exploring their integration, namely multi-agent systems product lines (MAS-PLs), to promote reuse and variability management in the context of complex software systems. However, current product derivation approaches do not provide specific mechanisms to deal with MAS-PLs. This is essential because they typically encompass several concerns (e.g., trust, coordination, transaction, state persistence) that are constructed on the basis of heterogeneous technologies (e.g., object-oriented frameworks and platforms). In this paper, we propose the use of multi-level models to support the configuration knowledge specification and automatic product derivation of MAS-PLs. Our approach provides an agent-specific architecture model that uses abstractions and instantiation rules that are relevant to this application domain. In order to evaluate the feasibility and effectiveness of the proposed approach, we have implemented it as an extension of an existing product derivation tool, called GenArch. The approach has also been evaluated through the automatic instantiation of two MAS-PLs, demonstrating its potential and benefits to product derivation and configuration knowledge specification.     

Variability extraction and modeling for product variants

Fast-changing hardware and software technologies in addition to larger and more specialized customer bases demand software tailored to meet very diverse requirements. Software development approaches that aim at capturing this diversity on a single consolidated platform often require large upfront investments, e.g., time or budget. Alternatively, companies resort to developing one variant of a software product at a time by reusing as much as possible from already-existing product variants. However, identifying and extracting the parts to reuse is an error-prone and inefficient task compounded by the typically large number of product variants. Hence, more disciplined and systematic approaches are needed to cope with the complexity of developing and maintaining sets of product variants. Such approaches require detailed information about the product variants, the features they provide and their relations. In this paper, we present an approach to extract such variability information from product variants. It identifies traces from features and feature interactions to their implementation artifacts, and computes their dependencies. This work can be useful in many scenarios ranging from ad hoc development approaches such as clone-and-own to systematic reuse approaches such as software product lines. We applied our variability extraction approach to six case studies and provide a detailed evaluation. The results show that the extracted variability information is consistent with the variability in our six case study systems given by their variability models and available product variants.     

面向软件产品家族的变化性建模方法

用户需求和运行环境的变化增加了软件产品开发、维护和演化的难度.另一方面,如果能对同类软件(比如软件产品家族)的变化性实施有效的控制,则可以极大地促进软件复用,提高软件生产效率和质量.对变化性建模是控制变化性的有效手段,既有助于变化性的识别和规约,又能够提供足够的机制支持变化性的演化.提出了一种面向产品家族的变化性建模方法,以变化性的管理策略为指导,从扩展的用况(use case)模型入手捕获系统行为的变化性,以特征模型来组织功能性需求和质量属性并识别其变化性,两种模型对变化性的建模采用相同的机制.还结合一个实例讨论了产品家族变化性建模的全过程.该研究对产品家族变化性的分析与建模具有一定的参考作用.     

Retrieval of software components using a distributed web system

Software reuse is important, especially product reuse. This paper describes a retrieval system for software components, the most popular form of product reuse. The system is distributed and embedded in the web and is based on structured retrieval using a classification schema.After defining the requirements for the system, we first discuss the advanced outside functionalities of the component retrieval system, as its multi-paradigmatic classification approach, the ability to extend/change the schema, the navigational facility through different views, and the system's interface to search engines. Then, the most interesting topics of the system's realization are discussed, as dynamic web page generation and personalization, how the specific environments for different roles are built, how schema modification is handled, and how the system was designed being driven by software for reuse. Some measurements of the system's outside behavior and its convenience for users are given.