To effectively manage Technical Debt (TD), we need reliable means to quantify it. We conducted a Systematic Mapping Study (SMS) where we identified TD quantification approaches that focus on different aspects of TD. Some approaches base the quantification on the identification of smells, some quantify the Return on Investment (ROI) of refactoring, some compare an ideal state with the current state of a software in terms of the software quality, and some compare alternative development paths to reduce TD. It is unclear if these approaches are quantifying the same thing and if they support similar or different decisions regarding TD Management (TDM). This creates the problem of not being able to effectively compare and evaluate approaches. To solve this problem, we developed a novel conceptual model, the Technical Debt Quantification Model (TDQM), that captures the important concepts related to TD quantification and illustrates the relationships between them. TDQM can represent varied TD quantification approaches via a common uniform representation, the TDQM Approach Comparison Matrix, that allows performing useful comparisons and evaluations between approaches. This paper reports on the mapping study, the development of TDQM, and on applying TDQM to compare and evaluate TD quantification approaches.
翻译:为了有效管理技术债务(TD),我们需要可靠的手段来量化技术债务(TD),我们进行了系统绘图研究(SMS),我们找出了TD量化方法,侧重于TD的不同方面。有些方法以气味的识别为基础进行量化,有些将再考虑因素的投资收益量化,有些将软件质量的理想状态与软件的现状进行比较,有些比较替代发展路径以减少TD。不清楚这些方法是否量化了同一件事,它们是否支持关于TD管理(TDM)的类似或不同决定。这造成了无法有效比较和评价方法的问题。为了解决这一问题,我们开发了一个新的概念模型,即技术债务量化模型(TDQM),它捕捉了与TD量化有关的重要概念,并说明了它们之间的关系。TDQM可以通过共同的统一代表方式代表不同的TD量化方法,即TDQM方法比较矩阵,从而能够对各种方法进行有益的比较和评价。关于绘图研究、TDQM的发展以及应用TDQM来比较和评价TDQM的方法的论文报告。</s>