Avionics Software Design Complexity Measure (ASDCM)

Complexity has been shown to be a valid measure of software maintainability. However, software complexity measures are currently focused on the analysis of completed code. Since an improvement in the design phase of a software product would reduce the overall cost of that software (i.e., identify problems early in the software's life cycle), it only makes sense to develop a metric which addresses software design complexity. The ability to objectively evaluate and measure the design complexity of software would allow a software developer to evaluate and compare competing candidate designs prior to any coding activities. Comparing design early in the software design cycle would then permit an early evaluation of the anticipated maintainability (and quality) of the final software product. The objective of this SBIR activity is to identify appropriate software design complexity methods for an eventual development of an automated tool which identifies and measures software design complexity. With the adherence to emerging standards and interoperability with other Computer Aided Software Engineering (CASE) tools, a fully developed Avionics Software Design Complexity Measure (ASDCM) would certainly be a desireable feature of a modern Software Engineering Environment.