The week's pick
Reseach Article
A Perspective-based Complexity Analysis Framework for UML Behavioral Diagrams
| International Journal of Computer Applications |
| Foundation of Computer Science (FCS), NY, USA |
| Volume 186 - Number 71 |
| Year of Publication: 2025 |
| Authors: Ann Wambui King’ori, Geoffrey Muchiri Muketha, John Gichuki Ndia |
10.5120/ijca2025924560
|
Ann Wambui King’ori, Geoffrey Muchiri Muketha, John Gichuki Ndia . A Perspective-based Complexity Analysis Framework for UML Behavioral Diagrams. International Journal of Computer Applications. 186, 71 ( Mar 2025), 52-59. DOI=10.5120/ijca2025924560
Abstract
Software designers are rapidly adopting UML behavioral diagrams to communicate the dynamic behavior of software. As is the case with many other software artefacts, these diagrams tend to get more complex whenever they are modified for either corrective or enhancement purposes thus compromising on their quality. Several researchers have proposed different measurement frameworks to assess the quality of the various software artefacts. However, these existing frameworks cannot be directly applied to assess UML behavioral diagrams which come with unique complexity perspectives not seen in traditional software. This paper, therefore, proposes a perspective-based framework for assessing the complexity of UML behavioral diagrams. The proposed framework identifies three complexity perspectives, namely, element, control-flow, and interaction perspective. Each perspective in turn defines a set of measurable attributes. The framework was validated using an expert opinion survey. Because of the difficulty in getting UML experts, purposive sampling was adopted to select eleven industry participants. Descriptive statistics was used for data analysis. Findings indicate that the proposed framework is effective and adequate in form, which implies that it can be a good tool for defining new complexity metrics for UML behavioral diagrams. Such metrics can in turn be used to predict the behavioral quality of software.
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