Reusing analogous components

Abstract

Using formal speci cations to represent software components facilitates the determination of reusability because they more precisely characterize the functionality of the software, and the well-de ned syntax makes processing amenable to automation. This paper presents an approach, based on formal methods, to the search, retrieval, and modi cation of reusable software components. From a two-tiered hierarchy of reusable software components, the existing components that are analogous to the query speci cation are retrieved from the hierarchy. The speci cation for an analogous retrieved component is compared to the query speci cation to determine what changes need to be applied to the corresponding program component in order to make it satisfy the query speci cation. This paper also describes an approach for assisting the modi cation of analogous components and gives an example to demonstrate its use.

A knowledge-based framework for extracting components in agile systems development

“…Formal specification is used to represent the generality relationship in terms of the semantic obligations of the component to satisfy the requirement. They present specification matching as a method for classifying, retrieving and modifying components [71]. Similarly, Penix and Alexander [76] use formal specifications of components to relate to domain specific feature-sets.…”

“…UML 2.0 allows for more appropriate descriptions of a component's dependencies and its interface specification so that components can be retrieved from repositories based on functional or behavioral criteria [69]. Several formal methods based approaches have been identified for matching components to user needs [70][71][72][73]. For example, Chen and Cheng [74] discuss a semantic foundation for specification matching between software requirements and components.…”

A survey of component based system quality assurance and assessment

“…Formal methods literature addresses issues in supporting component certification [16], component selection [17,18], component modification and component based system specification [19]. Addy et al [19] proposes a systematic technique for specification and verification of the critical aspects of component based system by isolating the dependencies between the critical subsystem and a component through formally stated mathematical and programmatic interface contracts.…”

Arifs Methodology: Reusing Incomplete Models at the Requirements Specification Stage

“…Cheng and Jeng [18] propose a two-tiered hierarchy for the repository based on formal specifications using OSPL (Order-Sorted Predicate Logic). The lower level is based on generality relationships; and the higher one on similarity relationships, which are assessed by a clustering algorithm.…”