A Controlled Experiment for Evaluating the Comprehensibility of UML Action Languages

Omar Badreddin, Maged Elaasar, Wahab Hamou-Lhadj

2016

Abstract

Action Languages represent an emerging paradigm where modeling abstractions are embedded in code to bridge the gap with visual models, such as UML models. The paradigm is gaining momentum, evident by the growing number of tools and standards that support this paradigm. In this paper, we report on a controlled ex-periment to assess the comprehensibility of those languages and compare it to that of object-oriented (OO) programming languages. We further report on the impact of also having access to the UML notation on the comprehensibility of those languages. Results suggest that action languages are significantly more comprehen-sible than traditional OO languages. Furthermore, there was not a significant improvement in comprehensibil-ity when the UML notation was used along with both OO and action language code. We conclude that action languages are a promising alternative to traditional OO languages for specifying details, yet seem to be as comprehensible as high-level visual models.

Paper Citation

in Harvard Style

Badreddin O., Elaasar M. and Hamou-Lhadj W. (2016). A Controlled Experiment for Evaluating the Comprehensibility of UML Action Languages . In Proceedings of the 4th International Conference on Model-Driven Engineering and Software Development - Volume 1: MODELSWARD, ISBN 978-989-758-168-7, pages 52-64. DOI: 10.5220/0005657700520064

in Bibtex Style

@conference{modelsward16,
author={Omar Badreddin and Maged Elaasar and Wahab Hamou-Lhadj},
title={A Controlled Experiment for Evaluating the Comprehensibility of UML Action Languages},
booktitle={Proceedings of the 4th International Conference on Model-Driven Engineering and Software Development - Volume 1: MODELSWARD,},
year={2016},
pages={52-64},
publisher={SciTePress},
organization={INSTICC},
doi={10.5220/0005657700520064},
isbn={978-989-758-168-7},
}

in EndNote Style

TY - CONF
JO - Proceedings of the 4th International Conference on Model-Driven Engineering and Software Development - Volume 1: MODELSWARD,
TI - A Controlled Experiment for Evaluating the Comprehensibility of UML Action Languages
SN - 978-989-758-168-7
AU - Badreddin O.
AU - Elaasar M.
AU - Hamou-Lhadj W.
PY - 2016
SP - 52
EP - 64
DO - 10.5220/0005657700520064