Recovering from a Decade: A Systematic Mapping of Information Retrieval Approaches to Software Traceability

Markus Borg, Per Runeson, Anders Ardö

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

729 Downloads (Pure)

Abstract

Engineers in large-scale software development have to manage large amounts of information, spread across many artifacts. Several researchers have proposed expressing retrieval of trace links among artifacts, i.e. trace recovery, as an Information Retrieval (IR) problem. The objective of this study is to produce a map of work on IR-based trace recovery, with a particular focus on previous evaluations and strength of evidence. We conducted a systematic mapping of IR-based trace recovery. Of the 79 publications classified, a majority applied algebraic IR models. While a set of studies on students indicate that IR-based trace recovery tools support certain work tasks, most previous studies do not go beyond reporting precision and recall of candidate trace links from evaluations using datasets containing less than 500 artifacts. Our review identified a need of industrial case studies. Furthermore, we conclude that the overall quality of reporting should be improved regarding both context and tool details, measures reported, and use of IR terminology. Finally, based on our empirical findings, we present suggestions on how to advance research on IR-based trace recovery.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)1565-1616
JournalEmpirical Software Engineering
Volume19
Issue number6
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2014

Subject classification (UKÄ)

  • Computer Science
  • Electrical Engineering, Electronic Engineering, Information Engineering

Free keywords

  • Traceability
  • Information retrieval
  • Software artifacts
  • Systematic mapping study

Fingerprint

Dive into the research topics of 'Recovering from a Decade: A Systematic Mapping of Information Retrieval Approaches to Software Traceability'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

Cite this