A framework for enhancing readability and opportunistic reuse of enterprise software

During in-house development of custom enterprise web based applications, a lot of reusable code is written by software developers. This code from smaller units to sub systems and sometimes even fully functional autonomous components is, at times, required in other projects due to related needs across the enterprise. In the absence of a component model based development, it becomes nearly impossible to organize, maintain and reuse such code. The challenge of meeting enterprise automation needs vis-à-vis an ever shrinking project timeline tends to provide for lesser code documentation time. This results into poorly documented source code that though provides required functionality on time and meets user requirements accurately, yet allows for minimal reuse, mostly relying on developer´s memory and is difficult to maintain. This problem is typically faced by newly built IT infrastructures in public sector organizations when business processes are being automated and new business requirements for automation keep accumulating. The job of a solution designer becomes complex when source code and component information is not organized in a way that allows for it to be reused in an upcoming project. This paper proposes a framework for documenting source code of custom developed enterprise application software that may not conform to a component model in the form of XML descriptors. Resultantly, it becomes possible to enhance the readability and opportunistic reuse of otherwise non reusable source code.