The use of UML class diagrams and its effect on code change-proneness

Abstract

The goal of this study is to investigate the use of UML and its impact on the change proneness of the implementation code. We look at whether the use of UML class diagrams, as opposed to using no modeling notation, influences code change proneness. Furthermore, using five design metrics we measure the quality of UML class diagrams and explore its correlation with code change proneness. Based on a UML model of an industrial system and multiple snapshots of the implementation code, we have found that at the system level the change proneness of code modeled using class diagrams is lower than that of code that is not modeled at all. However, we observe different results when performing the analysis at different system levels (e.g., subsystem and sub subsystem). Additionally, we have found significant correlations between class diagram size, complexity, and level of detail and the change proneness of the implementation code.