An Empirical Study of Bad Smells during Software Evolution Using Designite Tool

Volume 12 Issue 4 April - June 2018

Research Paper

An Empirical Study of Bad Smells during Software Evolution Using Designite Tool

Mamdouh Alenezi*, Mohammad Zarour**

* Chief Information & Technology Officer (CITO), Prince Sultan University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.

** Faculty Member, Computer and Information Sciences, Prince Sultan University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.

Alenezi, M., Zarour, M.(2018). An Empirical Study of Bad Smells during Software Evolution Using Designite Tool. i-manager's Journal on Software Engineering, 12(4), 12-27. https://doi.org/10.26634/jse.12.4.14958

Abstract

Bad smells are not uncommon in software systems. Such problems arise as a result of incomplete, inconsistent or incorrect requirements followed, accordingly, by bad design decisions which travel to the construction phase ending up with malfunctioning software. Such problems are expected to be handled and resolved during the evolution of the software which may result in more complicated systems that are difficult to maintain, and the software starts aging. Various tools are available to help in uncovering, analyzing and visualizing various bad smells. Once the bad smells are uncovered, a remedial action should be taken such as refactoring. One of the new tools to detect and measure a big number of bad smells is Designite. In this paper, we use Designite to analyze six open source systems and see if bad smells are resolved while software is evolving or systems keep stinking. We found that software quality, in terms of resolving bad smells, gained less focus as the software evolves on the expense of focusing on adaptive and corrective actions and that would keep the software stinking. We also discussed some recommendations on how to reduce bad smells during the software process and some other recommendations to enhance the Designite tool.