Validation of the coupling dependency metric as a predictor of run-time failures and maintenance measures

Abstract

The coupling dependency metric (CDM) is a successful design quality metric. Here we apply it to four case studies: run-time failure data for a COBOL registration system; maintenance data for a C text-processing utility; maintenance data for a C++ patient collaborative care system; and maintenance data for a Java electronic file transfer facility. CDM outperformed a wide variety of competing metrics in predicting run-time failures and a number of different maintenance measures. These results imply that coupling metrics may be good predictors of levels of interaction within a software product. Keywords---Metric, design quality, coupling, run-time failure, maintenance, validation 1. Introduction We have developed the coupling dependency metric (CDM), a design quality metric [1], and validated it using a test suite [2]. The suite consists of 18 pairs of designs together with the opinions of six design experts as to which of each of the design pairs is of higher quality. We took 16 differ...