Software Complexity and Maintencance Costs
Communications of the ACM; Nov93, Vol. 36 Issue 11, p81, 14p
Banker, Rajiv D.; Datar, Srikant M.; Kemerer, Chris F.; Zweig, Dani
The article presents information on software complexity and maintenance costs. While the link between the difficulty in understanding computer software and the cost of maintaining it is appealing, prior empirical evidence linking software complexity to software maintenance costs is relatively weak. Many of the attempts to link software complexity to maintainability are based on experiments involving small pieces of code, or are based on analysis of software written by students. Such evidence is valuable, but several researchers have noted that such results must be applied cautiously to the large-scale commercial application systems that account for most software maintenance expenditures. Further- more, the limited large-scale research that has been undertaken has generated either conflicting results or none at all, as, for example, on the effects of software modularity and software structure. Additionally, none of the previous work develops estimates of the actual cost of complexity, estimates that could be used by software maintenance managers to make the best use of their resources. While research supporting the statistical significance of a factor is, of course, a necessary first step in this process, practitioners must also have an understanding of the practical magnitudes of the effects of complexity if they are to be able to make informed decisions.

ISE Categories:  Maintainability