Cross-Validation of a Component Metrics Suite

This paper describes an independent validation study for a suite of reusability metrics for component based design published in the literature. The metrics under validation were originally proposed using a semi-formal notation, namely a combination of mathematical formulae with natural language descriptions for elementary parts of those formulae. They were then computed using proprietary tools. By contrast, we present a formalization for the metrics suite that combines the version 2.0 of the UML metamodel with OCL. This technique provides a formal, portable and executable definition of the metrics set that can be used to perform other cross-validations of the metrics suite. A prototype working environment to perform such cross-validation experiments, both with this and other metrics sets was developed and a metrics collection experiment using that environment is discussed.