Semantic vs. syntactic compositions in aspect-oriented requirements engineering

Abstract

Most current aspect composition mechanisms rely on syntactic references to the base modules or wildcard mechanisms quantifying over such syntactic references in pointcut expressions. This leads to the well-known problem of pointcut fragility. Semantics-based composition mechanisms aim to alleviate such fragility by focusing on the meaning and intention of the composition hence avoiding strong syntactic dependencies on the base modules. However, to date, there are no empirical studies validating whether semanticsbased composition mechanisms are indeed more expressive and less fragile compared to their syntax-based counterparts. In this paper we present a first study comparing semantics-and syntax-based composition mechanisms in aspect-oriented requirements engineering. In our empirical study the semantics-based compositions examined were found to be indeed more expressive and less fragile. The semantics-based compositions in the study also required one to reason about composition interdependencies early on hence potentially reducing the overhead of revisions arising from later trade-off analysis and stakeholder negotiations. However, this added to the overhead of specifying the compositions themselves. Furthermore, since the semantics-based compositions considered in the study were based on natural language analysis, they required initial effort investment into lexicon building as well as strongly depended on advanced tool support to expose the natural language semantics.

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“…Related empirical studies by Oliveira et al (2008) and Chitchyan et al (2009) propose metrics on the architectural level to quantify conflict rates, scaffolding, stability of compositions and expressiveness of compositions, but they cannot be used to confirm or refute our hypotheses. To avoid biassing the metrics, we aim to keep the metrics simple and self-explaining based on counting of elements (further discussed in the section on threads to validity).…”

Effects of stability on model composition effort: an exploratory study

“…For instance, Chitchyan et al [8] have defined some metrics, such as scaffolding and mobility, to quantify quality attributes of compositions between two or more requirements artifacts. However, their metrics are targeted at evaluating the reusability and stability of explicit descriptions of model composition specifications.…”

The AOSD Research Community in Brazil and Its Crosscutting Impact

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