Skip to main content

Feature Model Synthesis with Genetic Programming

  • Conference paper
Search-Based Software Engineering (SSBSE 2014)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNPSE,volume 8636))

Included in the following conference series:

Abstract

Search-Based Software Engineering (SBSE) has proven successful on several stages of the software development life cycle. It has also been applied to different challenges in the context of Software Product Lines (SPLs) like generating minimal test suites. When reverse engineering SPLs from legacy software an important challenge is the reverse engineering of variability, often expressed in the form of Feature Models (FMs). The synthesis of FMs has been studied with techniques such as Genetic Algorithms. In this paper we explore the use of Genetic Programming for this task. We sketch our general workflow, the GP pipeline employed, and its evolutionary operators. We report our experience in synthesizing feature models from sets of feature combinations for 17 representative feature models, and analyze the results using standard information retrieval metrics.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 44.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 59.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Preview

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

References

  1. Harman, M., Mansouri, S.A., Zhang, Y.: Search-based software engineering: Trends, techniques and applications. ACM Comput. Surv. 45(1), 11 (2012)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  2. Harman, M., McMinn, P., de Souza, J.T., Yoo, S.: Search based software engineering: Techniques, taxonomy, tutorial. In: Meyer, B., Nordio, M. (eds.) Empirical Software Engineering and Verification. LNCS, vol. 7007, pp. 1–59. Springer, Heidelberg (2012)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  3. de Freitas, F.G., de Souza, J.T.: Ten years of search based software engineering: A bibliometric analysis. In: Cohen, M.B., Ó Cinnéide, M. (eds.) SSBSE 2011. LNCS, vol. 6956, pp. 18–32. Springer, Heidelberg (2011)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  4. Poli, R., Langdon, W.B., McPhee, N.F.: A Field Guide to Genetic Programming. Lulu (2008)

    Google Scholar 

  5. Batory, D.S., Sarvela, J.N., Rauschmayer, A.: Scaling step-wise refinement. IEEE Trans. Software Eng. 30(6), 355–371 (2004)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  6. Lopez-Herrejon, R.E., Egyed, A.: Sbse4vm: Search based software engineering for variability management. In: Cleve, A., Ricca, F., Cerioli, M. (eds.) CSMR, pp. 441–444. IEEE Computer Society (2013)

    Google Scholar 

  7. Kang, K., Cohen, S., Hess, J., Novak, W., Peterson, A.: Feature-Oriented Domain Analysis (FODA) Feasibility Study. Technical Report CMU/SEI-90-TR-21, Software Engineering Institute, Carnegie Mellon University (1990)

    Google Scholar 

  8. Laguna, M.A., Crespo, Y.: A systematic mapping study on software product line evolution: From legacy system reengineering to product line refactoring. Sci. Comput. Program. 78(8), 1010–1034 (2013)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  9. Krueger, C.W.: Easing the transition to software mass customization. In: van der Linden, F.J. (ed.) PFE 2002. LNCS, vol. 2290, pp. 282–293. Springer, Heidelberg (2002)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  10. She, S., Ryssel, U., Andersen, N., Wsowski, A., Czarnecki, K.: Efficient synthesis of feature models. Information and Software Technology (in press, 2014)

    Google Scholar 

  11. Harman, M., Langdon, W.B., Weimer, W.: Genetic programming for reverse engineering. In: Lämmel, R., Oliveto, R., Robbes, R. (eds.) WCRE, pp. 1–10. IEEE (2013)

    Google Scholar 

  12. Lopez-Herrejon, R.E., Galindo, J.A., Benavides, D., Segura, S., Egyed, A.: Reverse engineering feature models with evolutionary algorithms: An exploratory study. In: Fraser, G., Teixeira de Souza, J. (eds.) SSBSE 2012. LNCS, vol. 7515, pp. 168–182. Springer, Heidelberg (2012)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  13. Lopez-Herrejon, R.E., Batory, D.: A standard problem for evaluating product-line methodologies. In: Bosch, J. (ed.) GCSE 2001. LNCS, vol. 2186, pp. 10–24. Springer, Heidelberg (2001)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  14. Benavides, D., Segura, S., Cortés, A.R.: Automated analysis of feature models 20 years later: A literature review. Inf. Syst. 35(6), 615–636 (2010)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  15. Stahl, T., Völter, M., Bettin, J., Haase, A., Helsen, S.: Model-driven software development - technology, engineering, management. Pitman (2006)

    Google Scholar 

  16. Manning, C.D., Raghavan, P., Schütze, H.: Introduction to information retrieval. Cambridge University Press (2008)

    Google Scholar 

  17. Benavides, D., Segura, S., Trinidad, P., Cortés, A.R.: Fama: Tooling a framework for the automated analysis of feature models. In: Pohl, K., Heymans, P., Kang, K.C., Metzger, A., eds.: VaMoS. Volume 2007-01 of Lero Technical Report, 129–134 (2007)

    Google Scholar 

  18. Segura, S., Galindo, J., Benavides, D., Parejo, J.A., Cortés, A.R.: BeTTy: Benchmarking and testing on the automated analysis of feature models. In: Eisenecker, U.W., Apel, S., Gnesi, S. (eds.) VaMoS, pp. 63–71. ACM (2012)

    Google Scholar 

  19. Luke, S.: Essentials of Metaheuristics. Lulu (2009) Available for free at http://cs.gmu.edu/~sean/book/metaheuristics/

  20. Arcuri, A., Briand, L.: A hitchhiker’s guide to statistical tests for assessing randomized algorithms in software engineering. Software Testing, Verification & Reliability (2012)

    Google Scholar 

  21. Vargha, A., Delaney, H.D.: A critique and improvement of the “cl” common language effect size statistics of mcgraw and wong. Journal of Educational and Behavioral Statistics 25(2), 101–132 (2000)

    Google Scholar 

  22. de Oliveira Barros, M., Neto, A.C.D.: Threats to Validity in Search-based Software Engineering Empirical Studies. Technical Report 0006/2011, Universidade Federal Do Estado Do Rio de Janeiro. Departamento de Informatica Aplicada (2011)

    Google Scholar 

  23. Faunes, M., Cadavid, J.J., Baudry, B., Sahraoui, H.A., Combemale, B.: Automatically searching for metamodel well-formedness rules in examples and counter-examples. In: [27], pp. 187–202

    Google Scholar 

  24. Haslinger, E.N., Lopez-Herrejon, R.E., Egyed, A.: On extracting feature models from sets of valid feature combinations. In: Cortellessa, V., Varró, D. (eds.) FASE 2013 (ETAPS 2013). LNCS, vol. 7793, pp. 53–67. Springer, Heidelberg (2013)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  25. Acher, M., Baudry, B., Heymans, P., Cleve, A., Hainaut, J.L.: Support for reverse engineering and maintaining feature models. In: Gnesi, S., Collet, P., Schmid, K. (eds.) VaMoS, pp. 20:1–20:8. ACM (2013)

    Google Scholar 

  26. Acher, M., Combemale, B., Collet, P., Barais, O., Lahire, P., France, R.B.: Composing your compositions of variability models. In: [27], pp. 352–369

    Google Scholar 

  27. Moreira, A., Schätz, B., Gray, J., Vallecillo, A., Clarke, P. (eds.): MODELS 2013. LNCS, vol. 8107. Springer, Heidelberg (2013)

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2014 Springer International Publishing Switzerland

About this paper

Cite this paper

Linsbauer, L., Lopez-Herrejon, R.E., Egyed, A. (2014). Feature Model Synthesis with Genetic Programming. In: Le Goues, C., Yoo, S. (eds) Search-Based Software Engineering. SSBSE 2014. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 8636. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-09940-8_11

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-09940-8_11

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-09939-2

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-09940-8

  • eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics