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A functional size measurement method for object-oriented conceptual schemas: design and evaluation issues

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Abstract

Functional Size Measurement (FSM) methods are intended to measure the size of software by quantifying the functional user requirements of the software. The capability to accurately quantify the size of software in an early stage of the development lifecycle is critical to software project managers for evaluating risks, developing project estimates and having early project indicators. In this paper, we present OO-Method Function Points (OOmFP), which is a new FSM method for object-oriented systems that is based on measuring conceptual schemas. OOmFP is presented following the steps of a process model for software measurement. Using this process model, we present the design of the measurement method, its application in a case study, and the analysis of different evaluation types that can be carried out to validate the method and to verify its application and results.

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Correspondence to Silvia Abrahão.

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Communicated by Dr. Jeff Offutt

Silvia Abrahão is Assistant Professor in the Department of Information Systems and Computation (DSIC) at the Valencia University of Technology, Spain. She is mainly working in the domain of software metrics, functional size measurement, empirical software engineering, and web engineering. She has published over 45 papers in these fields. She holds a PhD in Computer Science from Valencia University of Technology in 2004. Currently, she is a member of the OO-Method Research Group at the DISC and a board member of the Spanish Association of Software Metrics. She takes keen interested in industry activities and has been representing Spain in the International Software Benchmarking Standard Group (ISBSG). She also has been an editorial board member of the Spanish Journal on Process and Metrics for Information Technologies and a program committee member of the following venues: LA-Web 2005, IADIS WWW/Internet 2005, SBQS 2005, Interact’2005 Workshop on User Interface Quality Models, the Spanish Software Metrics Association Conference series, and the 2nd Software Measurement European Forum (SEMF 2005).

Geert Poels is a lecturer at the Department of Management Information, Operations Management and Technology Policy of Ghent University (UGent), Belgium, where he teaches economics and business students introductory courses on information technology and programming as well as advanced course units on data modeling, database design, information management, accounting information systems, and business process modeling. He is also a guest professor at the Centre for Industrial Management of the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven (KULeuven), also in Belgium, where he teaches ICT project management. He holds Master degrees in Business Engineering and Computer Science, and a Ph.D. in Applied Economic Sciences. Dr. Poels currently heads the Management Informatics research unit of Ghent University, where research is done in the areas of software metrics, with a focus on functional size measurement and structural complexity metrics for UML diagrams, quality aspects of conceptual modeling, empirical software engineering, enterprise information modeling, operational enterprise domain ontologies, and XBRL.

Oscar Pastor Professor, Head of Dept., Computation and Information Systems Department, Valencia University of Technology (Spain). PhD in 1992. Former researcher in HP Labs, Bristol, UK. Currently professor at the Valencia University of Technology. Author of over 100 research papers in conference proceedings, journals and books, received numerous research grants from public institutions and private industry. Research activities focus on web engineering, object-oriented conceptual modelling, requirements engineering, information systems and model-based software production. Leader of the project, undertaken since 1996 by the Valencia University of Technology and CONSOFT S.A., that has originated the Oliva Nova Model Execution, an advanced MDA-based tool that produces a final software product starting from a Conceptual Schema where the system requirements are captured. Within this tool scope, he is responsible of the research team working from the University on the improvement of the underlying framework, focusing on Business Process Modeling, Web Technologies and how to use properly Software and Arquitectural Patterns to go from the problem space to the solution space in an automated way. Member of over 50 Scientific Commitees of well-known International Conferences and Workshops as CAiSE, ER, WWW, DSV/IS, RE, ADBIS, ICWE, CADUI, DEXA, EC-WEB, ICEIS..., member of several editorial boards of journals and book series, he has been a participant researcher in national and international research projects, and has been invited to give over 30 talks and invited conferences in different universities and research centers.

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Abrahão, S., Poels, G. & Pastor, O. A functional size measurement method for object-oriented conceptual schemas: design and evaluation issues. Softw Syst Model 5, 48–71 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10270-005-0098-x

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