Estimating LOC Based on Conceptual Designs
Kelechi C. Anuforo
Department of Computer Science & Engineering
California State University San Bernardino
smugs2che_che@yahoo.com
ABSTRACT
Cost and effort estimation is vital in software management. Estimation of software size plays a major role in the estimation. Line of Code (LOC) is still a regularly used software size evaluation. Regardless of the fact that software measurement is well accepted as a significant problem for more than two decades, there is still much complication in existing methods. Conceptual designs are widely used in the requirements analysis for projects. It is also not difficult to construct conceptual design in the early stage of developing projects. Much characteristic of a project is actually reflected from its conceptual design. We explore into the use of conceptual data model for estimating LOC. This paper proposes a novel method for estimating LOC based on conceptual data model through the use of multiple linear regression models.
Categories and Subject Descriptors
D.2.8 Metrics '' Product metrics.
General Terms
Measurement.
Keywords
Software sizing, line of code (LOC), conceptual data model, multiple linear regression models.
1. INTRODUCTION
Software programs constitute one of the largest software domains [1, 2, 3]. This paper proposes a method to estimate the LOC for software programs from its conceptual data model. The entity-relationship (ER) model initially suggested by Chen [2] is usually regarded as the most broadly used tool for the conceptual data modeling of software projects. An ER model is designed to depict the concrete coordination of data, independent of the physical organization of the data and where and how data are used. An ER model is detailed in a diagram called an ER diagram. Class diagram is an evolution of ER diagram. ER diagram is equal to simple class diagram that preclude operations. The term conceptual data model shall refer to the...