Title :
Analyzing Exceptional Interfaces on Evolving Frameworks
Author :
Barbosa, Eiji Adachi ; Garcia, Alessandro
Author_Institution :
Inf. Dept., PUC-Rio, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Abstract :
Software frameworks are constantly evolving, either by the introduction of new product features, bug fixes or new technology adoption. During the evolution of a framework, new exceptional conditions arise, requiring that exception handling strategies be constantly revisited. However, introducing exception handling changes in a software framework project is far from trivial. Exception handling elements are usually scattered through the system and changing them may have a ripple impact not only on the components of the framework, but also on a whole family of systems build based on the framework. Thus, continuous and proactive exception handling design analysis plays a key role in order to achieve success during software evolution. This paper presents our preliminary results on analyzing exceptional interfaces on evolving frameworks. Exceptional interface is defined as a list of possible exception types raised by a module. We analyzed two mainstream Java open-source frameworks, revealing: (i) the strategies adopted by framework developers regarding exceptional interfaces, and (ii) how basic properties of exceptional interfaces evolved during framework evolution.
Keywords :
exception handling; software prototyping; Java open-source frameworks; exceptional interfaces; proactive exception handling design analysis; software evolution; software frameworks; Context; Contracts; Google; Java; Open source software; Programming; exception handling; software evolution; software frameworks;
Conference_Titel :
Dependable Computing Workshops (LADCW), 2011 Fifth Latin-American Symposium on
Conference_Location :
Sao Jose does Campos
Print_ISBN :
978-1-4577-0194-8
Electronic_ISBN :
978-0-7695-4394-9
DOI :
10.1109/LADCW.2011.19