METRIC ATTITUDE PLUG-IN FOR ECLIPSE USER GUIDE · The Eclipse IDE uses the Java environment, ... The Eclipse VIsualization Tolkit (ZEST) ... METRIC ATTITUDE PLUG-IN FOR ECLIPSE USER

Metric Attitude Pag. 0

METRIC ATTITUDE PLUG-IN FOR ECLIPSE USER GUIDE


CONTENTS

CONTENTS .................................................................................................... 1

INTRODUCTION .............................................................................................. 2

ECLIPSE ........................................................................................................ 2

1. INSTALLING ECLIPS FOR WINDOWS SYSTEM ................................................. 3

2. INSTALLING METRIC ATTITUDE .................................................................. 3

3. METRIC ATTITUDE .................................................................................. 9

4. METRIC ATTITUDE’S FEATURE AND METRICS ............................................. 10

4.1 Feature “Legend” .......................................................................... 10

4.2 Feature “Filter” ............................................................................. 12

4.3 Feature “Layout” ........................................................................... 14

4.4 Feature “Paint” ............................................................................. 19

5. EXAMPLE OF USE METRIC ATTITUDE ............................................................ 21

6. IDENTIFICATION AND REPRESENTATION OF BUG ............................................ 26


INTRODUCTION

This manual provides system requirements and instructions for installing Metric Attitude tool.

Metric Attitude is a visualization tool for the reverse engineering of Object Oriented Software.

The goal of our proposal is to ease both the comprehension of a subject system and the

identification of fault-prone classes with the help of a graphical representation..

The tool is implemented as an Eclipse plug-in and it is written in the Java programming language by Dr.

Michele Risi (University of Salerno) and Dr. Giuseppe Scanniello (University of Basilicata).

Below are listed the steps to install Metric Attitude in the Eclipse Rich Client Platform starting with version

3.7.0.

ECLIPSE

Eclipse is an integrated development environment (IDE), it can be used to develop Java applications, and by

means of various plug-ins, other programming languages including Ada, C, C + +, COBOL, Fortran, Haskell,

Perl, PHP, Python, R, Ruby, Scala, Clojure, Groovy, Android and Scheme.

The Eclipse SDK (which includes the Java development tools) is a free software and open source.

You can download eclipse 3.7.0 and above at the following link: http://www.eclipse.org/downloads/

http://www.eclipse.org/downloads/


1. INSTALLING ECLIPS FOR WINDOWS SYSTEM

You can download Eclipse software directly and freely from to following link:

http://www.eclipse.org/downloads/.

Extract the archive you just downloaded into the favorite directory

The Eclipse IDE uses the Java environment, usually already present in the distribution of software

downloaded. However, if there is no version 7 of Java, you can download the Italian version of the

runtime environment JRE7 from the site of Java (http://www.java.com/it/download/). A few steps

will be sufficient for installing Java, while at the end of this process you will see a test page to verify

the correct installation.

Enter into the working directory containing the Eclipse environment and run the file eclipse.exe.

Figure 1. Eclipse Interface

2. INSTALLING METRIC ATTITUDE

The plug-in MetricAttitude can be downloaded from the following link:

http://www.dmi.unisa.it/people/risi/www/MetricAttitude.html

Extract the compressed file into the workspace directory. This directory is created directly from

Eclipse during its installation.

When you run the file eclipse.exe you can import the plug-in Metric Attitude .

The command to import a plug-in or any software project within the Eclipse IDE is present in “File”

menu.

http://www.eclipse.org/downloads/

http://www.dmi.unisa.it/people/risi/www/MetricAttitude.html


Figure 2. Import a software project in Eclipse

User can click on Import Existing Projects into Workspace Next

Figure 3. The command to import an existing project in Eclipse

Select the path where the project Metric Attitude is content and then press “Finish” button when

activated


Figure 4. Select the project to import

The project or Plug-in imported will appear in “Project Explorer” containing all active projects in

Eclipse.

Figure 5. The project or plug-in successfully imported in Eclipse

Metric Attitude needs some plug-in not present in Eclipse to function correctly. For this reason,

before launching the Metric Attitude system you need to install these plug-in using the following

command Help Install New Software.


Figure 6. Installing external libraries in Eclipse system

Figure 7. The window containing libraries and plug-ins to be installed in Eclipse

Install the following plug-in. Ensure that you are connected to the network.

Ecore tool SDK (Incubation)

Graphical Modeling Framework (GMF)

The Eclipse VIsualization Tolkit (ZEST)

After finishing installation, you select the project PLayer present into the window Project Explorer

and launch a new configuration by using command Run Eclipse Application to run it.


Figure 8. Run an application directly from Eclipse environment

Before using functionality of Metric Attitude of a particular software system, you have to select

configuration parameters. Select from menu Window Preference, making to appear following

configuration window where you can select the voice Metric Attitude Preferences.

Figure 9. Setting parameters of the plugin Metric Attitude

Insert project data to be analyzed with the plug-in Metric Attitude. In particular, you select path in “Source file directory” by pressing “Browse”. In addition, you can select a report file containing description and location of bugs of system in question. Through the “Browse” button to is possible select the “File Bug” while in the “Bug Label” section you can choose from different software in the report, such as the system software "Eclipse Platform 3.5". Finally, you can select the level of detail


which the system Metric Attitude provides a description of operations performed by user. The item “Verbose level” allows to activate this feature. In following figure is selected level “Information” OK

Figure 10. Preferences Metric Attitude

In the windows Metric Attitude Commands, you can create a new project concerning software

project selected, and then analyze it. These operations are carried out respectively when user

clicks button “Create the project” and then “Analyze the project”.

Figure 11. Create a new project and analysis of the selected system


The following figure shows an example display of selected system (JHotdraw 5.1) and analyzed.

Figure 12. The system JHotDraw 5.1 in Metric Attitude

3. METRIC ATTITUDE

The interface of Metric Attitude is composed of three main sections:

On the left you can see “Project Explorer”section that will contain the Eclipse project created by

Metric Attitude.

On the right you can see “Metric Attitude” section that will contain the graph of project.

In lower section there are two button “Create the project” e “Analyze the project” that allow

respectively generate and evaluate the project

Figure 13. Il layout di Metric Attitude in Eclipse environment


4. METRIC ATTITUDE’S FEATURE AND METRICS

4.1 Feature “Legend”

Click on “Legend” will appear a small legend that describes metrics used. Each software

entity is represented with a node, which is graphically represented whit an ellipse and a rectangle

placed just below.

Figure 14. The legend of the metrics used by Metric Attitude

Metrics

Acronym Description

Weighted Methods per Class (WMC) It is the weighted sum of the methods of a class. The weight of a method is given by a factor of complexity to choice. To grow WMC increases complexity of class and decreases possibility of reuse.

Depth of Inheritance Tree (DIT)

It is the maximum distance of a node (class) from root of tree representing structure inherited.

Number of Children (NOC)

Number of subclasses, children of a super-class. The higher the NOC increases the level of reuse. The higher the NOC increases, the amount of testing required to test each subclass.

Coupling Between Object classes (CBO)

Number of collaborations of a class, or number of other classes to which it is coupled.

Response For a Class (RFC)

The response set of a class is a set of methods that can potentially be executed in response to a message received by an object of that class.

Flow Info (FI) It is computed on fan-in and fan-out as follows:


FI= L * (fan-in * fan- out)^2. L is a code size metric. It was used the LOC metric. FI is employed to measure testability. Fan-in measures the number of methods called in a software component. Conversely, fan-out is defined as the number of local flows out of a component.

Number of Message Sends (NMS)

It measures number of messages from a method. This metric is designed to be a unbiased measure of size of a method. The value for a class is achieved by summing the NMS values of all methods in the class.

Number of Methods (NM)

It represents number of method of a class and is used to determine complexity.

Lines Of Code (LOC)

It measure length of a program with number of lines of source code.

Number of Comments (NC)

It represents number of comment lines in body of a class and its methods.

Table 1 describes the graphical representation in Metric Attitude of metrics used and

possible relationships between classes.

Table 1. Graphical representation of the metrics and relationships in Metric Attitude

OO Metriche

WMC (Weighted Methods per Class)

DIT (Depth of Inheritance Tree)

NOC (Number Of Children)

CBO (Coupling Between Object classes)

RFC (Response For a Class)

Size of ellipse

Flatten the ellipse

Color of ellipse border

Thickness of ellipse border

Color of ellipse

Traditional code-size Metric

FI (Flow Info)

NMS (Number of Message Sends)

NM (Number of Methods)

LOC (Lines Of Code)

NC (Number of Comments)

Color of rectangle

Thickness of rectangle border

Color of rectangle border

Height of rectangle

Width of rectangle

Relationship

Gerarchia

Delegazione

Campo di accesso

Delegazione astratta

Delegazione virtuale

Metodo ciclico

Campo di accesso ciclico

Hollow triangle shape

Blue arrowed line

Cyan arrowed line

Orange arrowed line

Green arrowed line

Blue line

Cyan line

The dimension of ellipse denotes WMC. The convention is that the larger the ellipse, the higher the metric value is.


We used flattening of ellipse to represent DIT. The more the flattening, the higher the metric value is. The color of border of ellipse is used to denote NOC. The color is between light red and dark red. The higher the metric value, the darker the border is. We used thickness of border of ellipse to represent CBO. The larger the thickness, the higher the metric value is. To avoid loosing information about NOC, a thin border is drawn even if CBO is 0. The color of ellipse denotes RFC. The color ranges between black to white. Dark gray represents a smaller metric measurement than light gray. The color of rectangle denotes FI. Similar to RFC, color ranges between black and white. The lower the metric value, the darker the color is. We used thickness of border of rectangle to represent NMS. The larger the thickness, the higher the metric value is. We used the color of border of rectangle for NM. The color ranges between light and dark red. Light red represents a smaller metric measurement than dark red. The height of rectangle denotes LOC. Convention is that higher the metric value, the more the height of the rectangle is. Width of rectangle is used for NC. The higher the metric value, the more the width is.

Relationships between classes are showed , as shown Table 1, as lines: simple, arrowed, and hollow. These lines can assume different colors. With regard to the instance level relationships, we also considered the thickness of the lines associated. More the thickness, the larger the number of links between a source class to a target one is.

4.2 Feature “Filter”

The plug-in Metric Attitude allows you to graphically view the source code through a series of filters by

clicking icon “Filter” will appear the following image:

Figure 15. Menu to activate the filters in Metric Attitude

Inheritance: It allows you to view class inheritance with hollow triangle shape.

Delegation: It allows you to view relationships delegation (that is realized an object that makes it

accessible operations provided by the base class, delegating from the outside that is, without

inherit them, running to a base class object) by blue arrows, the greater is the thickness and the

higher is the number of links between delegator and delegate class. Shift a mouse to arrow,


activates a tooltip that shows the classes involved in the delegation and the number of connections

between them.

Virtual Delegation: It allows you to view relationships on virtual delegation classes that implement

a specified abstract method or interface (this is a kind of inheritance in which the part of the object

that belongs to virtual base class becomes a common base for the direct derived class and any

other class that derives). It is represented as a green arrow, where the thicker and higher is the

number of connections between the entities of the relationship. Moving mouse on arrow is active a

tooltip that shows the classes involved in virtual deletion and the number of connections between

them.

Abstract Delegation: It allows you to view abstract delegations (ie reports on a method that is

declared without implementation) between two classes by an orange arrow . Moving the mouse on

arrow is active a tooltip that shows classes involved in abstract delegation and the number of

connections between them.

Field Access: lets you view the access to instance variables of a class by a cyan arrow . Moving

mouse on arrow is active a tooltip that shows fields access involved and the number of links

between them.

Method Call/Field Access Loop: It allows you to view the method calls through the cyan circles .

Hovering the mouse over circle you activate a tooltip that show the names of methods involved

and the number of links between them.

Interface Classes: lets you see classes interfaces. Hovering the mouse on these classes you

activates a tooltip that shows the name of the interface and which classes implements.

Abstract Classes : It allows you to view the abstract classes. Moving the mouse over an abstract

class you activate a tooltip that shows the name of the abstract class, which class extends and

which is implemented. The following figure shows an example of the abstract class

CompositeFigure, where you see the numerical values of the metrics calculated by Metric Attitude.

Figure 16. Example tooltip of an abstract class

Anonymun Classes: lets you see the anonymous classes (they are a particular type of Java classes

that can be defined within the body of a method, and are unnamed). Moving the mouse on these


classes you activate a tooltip that shows all details of anonymous class, as well as numerical values

of the metrics.

Enum Classes: It displays the classes declared as an enumeration. They are represented graphically

by an ellipse and a rectangle placed just below. Moving the mouse on these classes you activate a

tooltip that shows all the details of enumerated class, and the numerical values of the metrics.

Concrete Classes: It displays all concrete classes of the selected system. Concrete classes are

represented graphically by an ellipse and a rectangle placed just below . Color, thickness and

flattening of the two forms represent different metrics. Moving the mouse over the concrete

classes you activate a tooltip that shows the name of the concrete class, and the numerical values

of the metrics.

4.3 Feature “Layout”

Metric Attitude implements different layouts to arrange classes of system.

Pressing the “Layout” the following window appears:

Figure 17. Possible layout algorithms in Metric Attitude


Grid Layout: This tool allows a two-dimensional representation of the grid. All classes represented

are arranged in a manner such as to horizontally and vertically the grid.

Figure 18. Grid layout

Shift Diagram Layout: It allows to center the entire diagram to the center of window through a

displacement downwards.

Figure 19. Shift Diagram layout


Horizontal Shift Layout: It allows horizontal displacement of diagram.

Figure20. Horizontal Shift layout

Tree Layout: The tree diagram represents the classes of the software system in a hierarchical taking

into account relations displayed.

Figure 21. Tree layout


Spring Layout: This type of layout has spiral classes in the diagram. Classes are arranged

considering the location of other classes. Entities connected by relationships are at the center of

window.

Figure 22. Spring layout

Radial Layout: It allows you to have the diagram in order to show the relationships of classes than

a parent class. All entities are arranged along a circumference of radius defined.

Figure 23. Radial layout


Horizontal Tree Layout: It allows the representation of a tree diagram showing the hierarchical

structure of the classes and display has horizontally.

Figure 24. Horizontal Tree layout

Composite Layout: It allows arrangement of classes through an algorithm layout compound. In

particular, the diagram is represented by means of layout superposed as Spring and Radial.

Figure 25. Composite layout


4.4 Feature “Paint”

Metric Attitude allows the representation of source code in class diagrams, click on “Paint”

following window appears:

Figure 26. Possible representations in Metric Attitude

Class Diagram : They are a type of diagram represented in notation of UML diagrams. These

diagrams allow to describe entity types, with their features and possible relationships between

these types. Moreover, classes of software system are shown with their attributes and methods.

Figure 207. Representation of classes in UML notation

OO Metric: This approach is based on metrics to identify design problems in object-oriented

software, offers a number of benefits, such as reusability, decomposition of problem in question is

easy to understand and aiding of future changes. Complexity metrics displayed by clicking on entity

are as follows: WMC (assigned to category of complexity, estimates number of methods involved in

a class), DIT (belonging to the category of inheritance, represents depth of class in inheritance

hierarchy), NOC (belonging to category of inheritance, represents number of children in a class),

CBO (belonging to category of complexity, it estimates number of objects to which a class is


coupled), RFC (belonging to category of complexity, because the greater the number of methods

that can be called by a class and the greater the complexity of the same).

Figure 28. Representation OO Metric

Traditional Code-size Metric : Clicking on entities that are represented by rectangles lets you view

following metrics: FI (assigned to category of complexity takes into account several aspects such as

metric size, number of incoming flows in component number of outgoing flows of component),

NMS, NM (assigned to category of complexity), LOC (belonging to class size, is to count all physical

lines of source code, number of statements, number of blank lines), NC (belonging to class size, is

to count number of comment lines in a class).

Figure 29. Representation Traditional Code-size Metric

OO-Traditional Code-size Metric: It allows the representation of the entities through an ellipse and

a rectangle placed just below and as soon as the user moves with cursor over the object you will

see a small "box" with additional information about object itself, it will check all the metrics: WMC,

DIT , NOC, CBO, RFC, FI, NMS, NM, LOC, NC.


Figure 30. Representation OO- Traditional Code-size Metric

5. EXAMPLE OF USE METRIC ATTITUDE

Figure 31. Example 1


Layout metric attitude enabled filters – Concrete Class, Inheritance, Delegation


Layout subject system enabled filters - Concrete Class, Inheritance, Delegation, Virtual Delegation



Layout subject system enabled filters – Concrete Class, Abstract Delegation, Field Access, Method

Call/Field Access Loop


Layout subject system enabled filters – Abstract Delegation, Interface Classes, Abstract Classes,

Anonymous Classes, Enum Classes, Concrete Classes



Metric Attitude allows to visualize all the parameters of an entity, such as: name, fields, methods,

and metrics, through a tooltip that action as soon as the mouse pointer is over the object graph

(see Figure 36).



Metric Attitude allows switch between the graphical notation to the source code written in Java by

clicking on the representation of the classes in the diagram shown. This allows the inspection of

source code from graphical representations of Metric Attitude.

Figure 37. Display of source code from graphical representations


6. IDENTIFICATION AND REPRESENTATION OF BUG

Metric Attitude support the identification of classes that potentially contain bugs. In order to highlight the

classes that contain the bug using the "Toggle Bug". In particular, the entities of the system software

analyzed that contain errors present in the selected report configuration phase are highlighted in yellow as

shown in Figure 38.

Figure 38. A view of Eclipse 3.5 framework for the identification of classes of risk bug

As shown in Table 2, a subset of the metrics used by Metric Attitude has been validated empirically on

commercial and open source software systems to determine if they can be used as predictive measures of

bugs. Table 2 shows the results obtained from four different evaluations respect the metrics considered.

For example, WMC with higher values imply a low probability of bugs, while for NOC shows the presence or

less of bugs according to the context defined by the values obtained considering other metrics.

Table 2. Predictive Metrics bug

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METRIC ATTITUDE PLUG-IN FOR ECLIPSE USER GUIDE · The Eclipse IDE uses the Java environment, ... The Eclipse VIsualization Tolkit (ZEST) ... METRIC ATTITUDE PLUG-IN FOR ECLIPSE USER