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• 1. [Article] How well do professional developers test with code coverage visualizations? An empirical study

  "Code coverage visualizations using block coverage neither guided developers toward productive testing strategies, nor did these visualizations motivate developers to write more tests or help them find ...

  Citation × Citation Citation Abstract Copy Title: How well do professional developers test with code coverage visualizations? An empirical study Author: Burnett, Margaret, 1949-, Lawrance, Joseph A., Clarke, Steven, Oregon State University. Dept. of Computer Science, Rothermel, Gregg "Code coverage visualizations using block coverage neither guided developers toward productive testing strategies, nor did these visualizations motivate developers to write more tests or help them find more faults than the control group. Nevertheless, code coverage visualizations did influence developers in a few important ways. Code coverage visualizations led developers to overestimate their test effectiveness more than the control group. Yet, these same visualizations reduced the variability in the number of test cases developers wrote by changing the standard developers used to evaluate their test effectiveness. Thus, the true power of testing visualizations lies not only with the faults that visualizations can highlight; it also lies in how visualizations can change how developers think about testing. Testing visualizations guide developers toward a particular standard of effectiveness, so if we want developers to test software adequately, we must ensure that the coverage criteria we choose to visualize leads developers toward a good standard of test effectiveness."--Conclusion Title: How well do professional developers test with code coverage visualizations? An empirical study Author: Burnett, Margaret, 1949-, Lawrance, Joseph A., Clarke, Steven, Oregon State University. Dept. of Computer Science, Rothermel, Gregg "Code coverage visualizations using block coverage neither guided developers toward productive testing strategies, nor did these visualizations motivate developers to write more tests or help them find more faults than the control group. Nevertheless, code coverage visualizations did influence developers in a few important ways. Code coverage visualizations led developers to overestimate their test effectiveness more than the control group. Yet, these same visualizations reduced the variability in the number of test cases developers wrote by changing the standard developers used to evaluate their test effectiveness. Thus, the true power of testing visualizations lies not only with the faults that visualizations can highlight; it also lies in how visualizations can change how developers think about testing. Testing visualizations guide developers toward a particular standard of effectiveness, so if we want developers to test software adequately, we must ensure that the coverage criteria we choose to visualize leads developers toward a good standard of test effectiveness."--Conclusion Close

• 2. [Article] A meta-model for software process maturity

  We present a meta-model as a process maturity framework that can be effectively used to identify the key practices to initiate and sustain a software process improvement effort focused on a single process ...

  Citation × Citation Citation Abstract Copy Title: A meta-model for software process maturity Author: Cook, Curtis R., Visconti, Marcello, Oregon State University. Dept. of Computer Science We present a meta-model as a process maturity framework that can be effectively used to identify the key practices to initiate and sustain a software process improvement effort focused on a single process area. Our approach moves away from the overall software development process and computation of maturity levels and focuses on a particular process area or task and its key practices. In determining process maturity our framework takes into account not only the process dimension but also the quality and usability of the products or deliverables of the process. We demonstrate the applicability of the proposed meta-model by generating key practices for several software process areas and tasks including system documentation, quality assurance and configuration management. We show that our approach is able to identify a complete set of key practices to assess a process and generate recommendations that facilitate the development of an action plan for the software process improvement effort. Title: A meta-model for software process maturity Author: Cook, Curtis R., Visconti, Marcello, Oregon State University. Dept. of Computer Science We present a meta-model as a process maturity framework that can be effectively used to identify the key practices to initiate and sustain a software process improvement effort focused on a single process area. Our approach moves away from the overall software development process and computation of maturity levels and focuses on a particular process area or task and its key practices. In determining process maturity our framework takes into account not only the process dimension but also the quality and usability of the products or deliverables of the process. We demonstrate the applicability of the proposed meta-model by generating key practices for several software process areas and tasks including system documentation, quality assurance and configuration management. We show that our approach is able to identify a complete set of key practices to assess a process and generate recommendations that facilitate the development of an action plan for the software process improvement effort. Close

• 3. [Article] Algorithm animation in a declarative visual programming language

  How might capabilities for algorithm animation be seamlessly integrated into a programming language that is both visual and declarative? Until now, visual programming language researchers have not attempted ...

  Citation × Citation Citation Abstract Copy Title: Algorithm animation in a declarative visual programming language Author: Burnett, Margaret, 1949-, Carlson, Paul M., Oregon State University. Dept. of Computer Science How might capabilities for algorithm animation be seamlessly integrated into a programming language that is both visual and declarative? Until now, visual programming language researchers have not attempted to answer that question, making the fruits of algorithm animation available only to users of textual progranming languages. Users of visual programming languages (VPLs) have been deprived of the unique semantic insights algorithm animation offers, insights that would foster the understanding and debugging of visual programs. We have answered the question by seamlessly integrating algorithm animation capabilities into Forms/3, a general-purpose, declarative VPL. Our results show that such a VPL can support algorithm animation without leaving the declarative, visual model, without adding new concepts to the language or how to program in it, and without deviating from the uniform representation established for the language. In addition, our research shows that the characteristics of declarative VPLs result in some interesting algorithm animation features not found in other systems. Title: Algorithm animation in a declarative visual programming language Author: Burnett, Margaret, 1949-, Carlson, Paul M., Oregon State University. Dept. of Computer Science How might capabilities for algorithm animation be seamlessly integrated into a programming language that is both visual and declarative? Until now, visual programming language researchers have not attempted to answer that question, making the fruits of algorithm animation available only to users of textual progranming languages. Users of visual programming languages (VPLs) have been deprived of the unique semantic insights algorithm animation offers, insights that would foster the understanding and debugging of visual programs. We have answered the question by seamlessly integrating algorithm animation capabilities into Forms/3, a general-purpose, declarative VPL. Our results show that such a VPL can support algorithm animation without leaving the declarative, visual model, without adding new concepts to the language or how to program in it, and without deviating from the uniform representation established for the language. In addition, our research shows that the characteristics of declarative VPLs result in some interesting algorithm animation features not found in other systems. Close