On the understandability of coupling-related practices in infrastructure-as-code based deployments

IF 4.3 2区计算机科学 Q2 COMPUTER SCIENCE, INFORMATION SYSTEMS

Information and Software Technology Pub Date : 2025-05-21 DOI:10.1016/j.infsof.2025.107761

Pierre-Jean Quéval , Nicole Elisabeth Hörner , Evangelos Ntentos , Uwe Zdun

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引用次数: 0

Abstract

Infrastructure as Code (IaC) empowers software developers and operations teams to automate the deployment and management of IT infrastructure through code. This is particularly valuable for continuously released deployments such as microservices and cloud-based systems. IaC technologies offer flexibility in provisioning and deploying application architectures. However, if the structure is not well-designed, it can lead to severe issues related to coupling aspects. Unfortunately, a lack of comprehensive coupling guidelines for IaC makes ensuring adherence to best practices challenging. Leveraging IaC-based models, metrics, and source code can enhance the comprehension and implementation of coupling measures.

Our objective was to investigate how developers understand information derived from system source code and compare it to formal IaC system diagrams and metrics. We conducted a controlled experiment involving a group of participants to evaluate the understandability of IaC system architecture descriptions through source code inspection and formal representations.

We hypothesized that providing formal IaC system diagrams and metrics as supplementary materials would improve the understanding of IaC coupling-related practices measured by task correctness. We also expected that these supplementary resources would lead to a significant increase in task duration and that there would be a notable correlation between correctness and duration.

The results suggest that including formal IaC system diagrams and metrics as supplementary materials significantly enhances the comprehension of IaC coupling-related practices, as indicated by task correctness. Moreover, providing these formal representations does not significantly prolong task duration, indicating that they do not hinder understanding. A substantial correlation between task correctness and duration is evident when formal IaC system diagrams and metrics are available.

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关于在基于基础设施即代码的部署中耦合相关实践的可理解性

基础设施即代码（IaC）使软件开发人员和操作团队能够通过代码自动部署和管理IT基础设施。这对于持续发布的部署（如微服务和基于云的系统）尤其有价值。IaC技术在供应和部署应用程序架构方面提供了灵活性。但是，如果结构设计得不好，就会导致与耦合方面相关的严重问题。不幸的是，IaC缺乏全面的耦合指南，这使得确保遵守最佳实践具有挑战性。利用基于iac的模型、度量和源代码可以增强耦合度量的理解和实现。我们的目标是调查开发人员如何理解来自系统源代码的信息，并将其与正式的IaC系统图和度量进行比较。我们进行了一个包含一组参与者的控制实验，通过源代码检查和正式表示来评估IaC系统架构描述的可理解性。我们假设，提供正式的IaC系统图和度量作为补充材料，将提高对通过任务正确性度量的IaC耦合相关实践的理解。我们还预计，这些补充资源将导致任务持续时间的显著增加，并且正确性和持续时间之间存在显著的相关性。结果表明，将正式的IaC系统图和度量作为补充材料显著提高了对IaC耦合相关实践的理解，这表明了任务正确性。此外，提供这些形式表示不会显著延长任务持续时间，这表明它们不会阻碍理解。当正式的IaC系统图和度量可用时，任务正确性和持续时间之间的实质性关联是显而易见的。

本文章由计算机程序翻译，如有差异，请以英文原文为准。

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来源期刊

Information and Software Technology 工程技术-计算机：软件工程

CiteScore

9.10

自引率

7.70%

发文量

164

审稿时长

9.6 weeks

期刊介绍： Information and Software Technology is the international archival journal focusing on research and experience that contributes to the improvement of software development practices. The journal''s scope includes methods and techniques to better engineer software and manage its development. Articles submitted for review should have a clear component of software engineering or address ways to improve the engineering and management of software development. Areas covered by the journal include: • Software management, quality and metrics, • Software processes, • Software architecture, modelling, specification, design and programming • Functional and non-functional software requirements • Software testing and verification & validation • Empirical studies of all aspects of engineering and managing software development Short Communications is a new section dedicated to short papers addressing new ideas, controversial opinions, "Negative" results and much more. Read the Guide for authors for more information. The journal encourages and welcomes submissions of systematic literature studies (reviews and maps) within the scope of the journal. Information and Software Technology is the premiere outlet for systematic literature studies in software engineering.