Elis Montoro Hernandes

Externalising tacit knowledge of the systematic review process

Systematic Reviews (SRs) have recently intensified in Software Engineering. However, there is a lack of work that makes explicit how the process to perform SR is in practice. The goal of this paper is externalising the process that reflects how SRs are currently performed, transforming tacit knowledge into explicit knowledge. We describe the phases and activities that compose the process and the relationship among them, and explore the iterative characteristic of this process, focusing on intra- and inter-phase iterations that are necessary to conduct the process appropriately. To achieve the proposed goal, we devised the process based on practical experience acquired for several years by research groups in Software Engineering, which include graduate students and researchers who have applied SR. The process has been applied in several SRs and seems to be effective in keeping the focus of the review at all phases. Moreover, the externalisation of the process has been useful to help researchers improving the process execution quality. As the process reflects the practice and is explained in details, it can be used as a guide to better understand the SR process and its details. This shall contribute to improve all SR process phases, and hence the quality of SR results.

Using Information Visualization and Text Mining to Facilitate the Conduction of Systematic Literature Reviews

Systematic Literature Review (SLR or SR) and Systematic Mapping (SM) are scientific literature review techniques that follow well-defined stages, according to a protocol previously elaborated. Besides systematizing the search for relevant studies, the SR predicts the organization and the analysis of the obtained results. However, the SR application is laborious because there are many steps to be followed. Aiming to offer computational support to SR and SM, the StArt (State of the Art through Systematic Review) tool was developed. Besides helping the steps of SR or SM, the StArt tool has implemented visualization and text mining techniques to support the conduction and the reporting of the SR or SM. A comparative analysis was carried out in relation to StArt and other similar tools.

A Strategy to Support Software Planning Based on Piece of Work and Agile Paradigm

Background: The estimation of iterations must be as precise as possible, especially for the agile methods, since the success of this kind of development is intrinsically related to this fact. Aim: In order to establish a systematic planning of iterations, this paper presents the PW-Plan strategy that works with different planning techniques and a generic unit of work to plan the iteration, under the agile paradigm development focus. Method: PW-Plan strategy was extracted from a real software development process and evolved from another strategy that combines the application of Use Case Points and Personal Software Process. Results: PW-Plan was applied in two case studies of two small businesses companies that showed the feasibility of its application. Conclusion: The case studies provided insights of the PW-Plan contribution for both the developer’s and the manager’s processes. Also, its application provides more precise estimations for each iteration.

Using Visualization and a Collaborative Glossary to Support Ontology Conceptualization

Although there are tools that support the ontology construction, such tools do not necessarily take heed to the conceptualization phase in its need of execution resources. The objective of this paper is to present the use of visualization and collaborative glossary as an effective means of enhancing the conceptualization phase of the ontology construction. These resources are being applied through the process named ONTOP (ONTOlogy conceptualization Process) which is supported by the ONTOP-Tool that provides an iterative way to defining the collaborative glossary and uses a visual metaphor to facilitate the identification of the ontology components. Once the components are defined, it is possible to generate an OWL file that can be used as an input to other ontology editors. The paper also presents an application of the both process and the tool, which emphasizes the contributions of this proposal.

Using the Dependence Level Among Requirements to Priorize the Regression Testing Set and Characterize the Complexity of Requirements Change

Background: When there are changes in software requirements, other phases of software development are impacted and frequently, extra effort is needed to adjust the previous developed artifacts to new features or changes. However, if the development team has the traceability of requirements, the extra effort could be not an issue. An example is the software quality team, which needs to define effective tests cycles in each software release. Goal: This papers aims to present an approach based on requirements dependence level to support the regression test prioritization and identify the real impact of requirement changes. Method: The designed approach is based on automatic definition of Requirements Traceability Matrix with three different dependence levels. Moreover, dependence between requirement and test case is also defined. A case study in a real software development industry environment was performed to assess the approach. Results: Identifying the dependence level among requirements have allowed the quality assurance team priorize regression tests and, by means of these tests, defects are early identified if compared with tests execution without priorization. Moreover, the requirements changes complexity is also identified with the approach support. Conclusion: Results shows that definition of dependence levels among requirements gives two contributions: (i) allowing test prioritization definition, which become regression test cycle more effective, (ii) allowing characterize impacts of requirements changes, which is commonly requested by stakeholders.

Using Visualization and Text Mining to Improve Qualitative Analysis

Context: Qualitative analysis is a scientific way to deeply understand qualitative data and to aid in its analysis. However, qualitative analysis is a laborious, time-consuming and subjective process. Aim: The authors propose the use of visualization and text mining to improve the qualitative analysis process. The objective of this paper is to explain how the use of visualization can support the Coding in multiple documents simultaneously, which may allow codes standardization thus making the process more efficient. Method: The Insight tool is being developed to make the proposal feasible and a feasibility study was performed to verify if the proposal offers benefits to the process and improves its results. Results: The study shows that the subjects who applied the proposal got more standardized codes and were more efficient than the ones who applied the process manually. Conclusions: The results derived from the use of visualization and text mining, even in a feasibility study, encourage proceeding with the project, which aims to combine both techniques to obtain more benefits on qualitative analysis conduction.

An Overview of Experimental Studies on Software Inspection Process

Software inspection process is an effective activity to find defects on software artifacts as soon as they are introduced. The development of experimental knowledge on this area is useful to everyone who needs to make decisions about inspection activity. This paper aims to map the empirical studies conducted in the software inspection process area. The steps of the Systematic Mapping (SM) process was performed with the support of the StArt tool. Seventy nine papers were accepted in this SM and attributes related to inspection process, techniques, tools, inspected artifacts, research groups and universities were extracted. The results show different inspection processes, which have been experimentally investigated. Fagan’s process is the most investigated of them. In relation to inspected artifacts, requirements document and source code were the most used. Moreover, different tools and techniques have been used to support these processes.