Program Execution-Based Module Cohesion Measurement

Module cohesion describes the degree to which di erent actions performed by a module contribute towards a uni ed function. High module cohesion is a desirable property of a program. The program modi cations during successive maintenance interventions can have negative e ect on the structure of the program resulting in less cohesive modules. Therefore, metrics that measure module cohesion are important for software restructuring during maintenance. The existing static slice based module cohesion metrics signi cantly overestimate cohesion due to the limitations of static slicing. In this paper, we present a novel program execution based approach to measure module cohesion of legacy software. We de ne cohesion metrics based on de nition-use pairs in the dynamic slices of the outputs. Our approach signi cantly improves the accuracy of cohesion measurement. We implemented our technique and measured module cohesion for several programs. Cohesion measurements using our technique were found to be more insightful than static slice based