Authors:
Thais S. Nepomuceno
and
Edson OliveiraJr
Affiliation:
State University of Maringá, Maringá, Brazil
Keyword(s):
Class Diagram, Experiment, Product Configuration, Sequence Diagram, Software Product Lines, Traceability, UML.
Abstract:
A set of systems that share common and variable parts is called a Software Product Line (SPL). These kind of systems are usually part of the same market segment. Their elements that vary are what allow the diversification among products from the same family, thus managing variability is an important issue of SPL engineering. There are few studies in the literature that evaluate and compare approaches to SPL variability management in UML-based SPLs. In this work, two of the existing approaches, SMarty and Ziadi et al., are compared throughout an experiment to verify: the effectiveness in configuring products based on UML class and sequence diagrams; the influence of the participants knowledge on UML, SPL and variability in the effectiveness results; and how traceability is performed in each approach. Results show the SMarty approach is statically superior with relation to Ziadi et al. for the effectiveness at configuring products with class and sequence diagrams. Regarding the knowled
ge level needed to a better effectiveness, SMarty demands less knowledge than Ziadi et al. In addition, Ziadi et al. provides no means to round-trip trace variabilities in class and sequence diagrams, thus SMarty was previously designed to allow it.
(More)