Software architecture analysis: a dynamic slicing approach

As the complexity of software systems increases, so does the need for a good mechanism of abstraction. Software architecture design is an abstraction, hiding an immense amount of details about the data structures, algorithms, idiosyncrasies of programming language constructs, etc. that may be used in implementing the system-to-be. Fundamental as it may be to the modeling of the system, the very nature of this high level abstraction can also pose difficulties with the understanding and analysis of the behavior of the systemto-be. This paper introduces the notion of dynamic software architecture slicing (DSAS) in order to alleviate such difficulties. A dynamic software architecture slice represents the run-time behavior of those parts of the software architecture that are selected according to a particular slicing criterion such as a set of resources and events. This paper also describes a methodology for using the notion, and an algorithm to generate dynamic software architecture slices. The feasibility and the expected benefits of the approach is demonstrated through a study of part of an electronic commerce system and a run-time execution of its architecture using a tool.