A Model-Based Approach to Object-Oriented Software Metrics

The need to improve software productivity andsoftware quality has put forward the research on software metricstechnology and the development of software metrics tool to supportrelated activities. To support object-oriented software metricspractice effectively, a model-based approach to object-orientedsoftware metrics is proposed in this paper. This approach guides themetrics users to adopt the quality metrics model to measure theobject-oriented software products. The development of the model can beachieved by using a top-down approach. This approach explicitlyproposes the conception of absolute normalization computation andrelative normalization computation for a metrics model. Moreover, ageneric software metrics tool --- Jade Bird Object-Oriented Metrics Tool(JBOOMT) is designed to implement this approach. The parser-basedapproach adopted by the tool makes the information of the sourceprogram accurate and complete for measurement. It supports variouscustomizable hierarchical metrics models and provides a flexible userinterface for users to manipulate the models. It also supports absoluteand relative normalization mechanisms in different situations.