Software Design Metrics: What You Need to Know

Posted by Barr Albrechtsen on March 24th, 2021

Software design is known as a procedure for developing specific software solutions and solving problems associated with it. No wonder, this procedure requires a well-thought step-by-step approach that could influence the efficacy of software development and opportune completion of most related tasks. As a rule, any decision is affected by the applicable development environment. This is true when you have to devise an instantaneous solution or apply proven and trustworthy design patterns and frameworks. Depending on the accessibility of software design technology, the whole process may be subdivided directly into two types, namely platform-oriented and platform-independent. As far as there are several issues to be considered when making any software, there is a need to come up to this process smartly. Sometimes you will find a necessity to identify and analyze design problems and find most convenient way outs of such situations. This is exactly where software design metrics will come in handy. They're generally used to measure and improve the quality of applied patterns. Such metrics or indicators measure specifications and properties of these designs, so the main goal of their implementation is obtaining quantifiable, reliable and reproducible results that may be further used in budget planning, software optimization, estimation of related expenses etc. Apart from this, metrics are highly helpful when it comes to the estimation of certain software aspects and providing a good insight into this process or the ultimate product. Thus, indicators we are talking about are associated with specific design aspects, which will make them a powerful tool in adopting decisions that affect the design and quality of software. The process of software development is quite painstaking, so the selection of the most suitable metrics may occasionally pose problems. Technology and Software is also true with regards to the analysis and measurement of corresponding quantities and qualities of a particular piece of software. Another complication is identification of the extremely essence of metrics and their role in the measurement process. Development and implementation of software metrics means a whole lot when there is a necessity to choose among several patterns or designs, that offer solution to one and exactly the same problem with regard to quality aspects. This can help identify what parts of a particular patter require improvement for better software performance. The whole process is analyzed from the point of view of 4 perspectives. Thus, "quality perspective" is actually applied to assess the compatibility, reliability, security related capacity as well as other features connected with quality enhancement. Key performance indicators measured within the "Logical size and complexity" category cope with average software development time and cyclamate intricacy, while KPIs related to the "Exception handling and operations" group represent such metrics as level of runtime and failure fraction exceptions, total level of operations in adition to that of manually created exclusions. "Design efforts" metrics, in their turn, may be calculated through fractioning the overall quantity of applied effort, that is represented by such indicators as learning, creation, review and, needless to say, testing and improvement.

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Barr Albrechtsen

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Barr Albrechtsen
Joined: March 23rd, 2021
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