An interaction environment supporting the retrievability of reusable software components

The card-based system presented is appropriate for supporting the reuse of code and test cases with respect to small size software projects. EasyCard is a system tailored for running on personal computers. Such a system provides the user with an easy to use interaction environment where the user can enter into and retrieve from a library information about available software components. Specifically, EasyCard features a screen-frame-based data acquisition facility, a graphical query language for retrieving information about software components, and, finally, a browsing environment suitable to explore the retrieved information. Visual feedback about the current status of the exploration prevents programmer´s disorientation