Improving reusability of modules in software product line by feature tree analysis: The case of an OSGi-framed radar user interface

Software reuse is an important practice in software development because of its potential to reduce costs by shortening development time and increasing software quality. Although software reuse is applied in different development methodologies, it is the main concept in Component Based Software Development and Software Product Line Development approaches. The academia has proposed different methods and metrics to analyze software reusability. This study aims at improving the reusability of a radar user interface software, which has an architecture based on a software product line approach and service based platform for modular software, namely the OSGi Framework. Studies that measure reusability of OSGi and product line based software have been searched systematically. According to the results of systematic research study, software reusability factors and software reusability metrics are determined. According to software reusability measurement results, software is refactored based on Feature Tree method. The method, which is proposed in this study, has been used to refactor for four radar user interface software that have been developed using Java to improve reusability. The method has been used to refactor for four radar user interface software that have been developed using Java to improve reusability. After refactoring, it's observed that LCOM, CC, WMC and ACD metrics were dropped down. Statistical significance analysis is used to evaluate change of significance of ACD metrics that were measured before refactoring and after refactoring. Accordingt to results, it's observed that method proposed is significance for Project-1, Project-2 and Project-4 while it's insignificant for Project-3.