computer science

Software diagnosis

Software diagnosis is a computer science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Software diagnosis rather than just read about it. In short: Software diagnosis (also: software diagnostics) refers to concepts, techniques, and tools that allow for obtaining findings, conclusions, and evaluations about software systems and their implementation, composition, behaviour, and evolution. It serves as means to monitor, steer, observe and optimize software development, software maintenance, and software re-engineering in the sense of a business intelligence approa…

Key takeaways

Software diagnosis belongs to computer science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Software diagnosis to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Software diagnosis from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Software diagnosis (also: software diagnostics) refers to concepts, techniques, and tools that allow for obtaining findings, conclusions, and evaluations about software systems and their implementation, composition, behaviour, and evolution. It serves as means to monitor, steer, observe and optimize software development, software maintenance, and software re-engineering in the sense of a business intelligence approach specific to software systems. It is generally based on the automatic extraction, analysis, and visualization of corresponding information sources of the software system. It can also be manually done and not automatic.

Applications Software diagnosis supports all branches of software engineering, in particular project management, quality management, risk management as well as implementation and test. Its main strength is to support all stakeholders of software projects (in particular during software maintenance and for software re-engineering tasks) and to provide effective communication means for software development projects. For example, software diagnosis facilitates "bridging an essential information gap between management and development, improve awareness, and serve as early risk detection instrument". Software diagnosis includes assessment methods for "perfective maintenance" that, for example, apply "visual analysis techniques to combine multiple indicators for low maintainability, including code complexity and entanglement with other parts of the system, and recent changes applied to the code".

Characteristics In contrast to manifold approaches and techniques in software engineering, software diagnosis does not depend on programming languages, modeling techniques, software development processes or the specific techniques used in the various stages of the software development process. Instead, software diagnosis aims at analyzing and evaluating the software system in its as-is state and based on system-generated information to bypass any subjective or potentially outdated information sources (e.g., initial software models). For it, software diagnosis combines and relates sources of information that are typically not directly linked. Examples:

Source-code metrics are related with software developer activity to gain insight into developer-specific effects on software code quality. System structure and run-time execution traces are correlated to facilitate program comprehension through dynamic analysis in software maintenance tasks.

Principles The core principle of software diagnosis is to automatically extract information from all available information sources of a given software projects such as source code base, project repository, code metrics, execution traces, test results, etc. To combine information, software-specific data mining, analysis, and visualization techniques are applied. Its strength results, among various reasons, from integrating decoupled information spaces in the scope of a typical software project, for example development and developer activities (recorded by the repository) and code and quality metrics (derived by analyzing source code) or key performance indicators (KPIs).

Examples Examples of software diagnosis tools include software maps and software metrics.

Critics Software diagnosis—in contrast to many approaches in software engineering—does not assume that developer capabilities, development methods, programming or modeling languages are right or wrong (or better or worse compared to each other): Software diagnosis aims at giving insight into a given software system and its status regardless of the methods, languages, or models used to create and maintain the system.

Related subjects Cost estimation in software engineering Programming productivity Rapid application development Software design Software development Software documentation Software map Software release life cycle Systems design Systems Development Life Cycle

References

External links A tool set based on software maps by Software Diagnostics, 2014 Demo video interactive software maps for source-code analysis, 2013

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Software diagnosis

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Software diagnosis claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In computer science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Software diagnosis before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Software diagnosis ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Software diagnosis

In research: Software diagnosis appears in computer science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Software diagnosis in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Software diagnosis is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics Software engineering, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Software diagnosis outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Software diagnosis in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Software diagnosis means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Software diagnosis out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Software diagnosis in simple terms?

Why does Software diagnosis matter?

Because it connects several computer science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Software diagnosis?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Software diagnosis.