Chapter 9. Using Software Metrics to Ensure Maintainability
In this chapter I will introduce a couple of interesting software metrics that can be used for project governance. They measure aspects like code coupling, architectural erosion, code complexity, and design quality. Used in the right way, they can play an important role in keeping maintainability high, lowering overall development and maintenance costs, and mitigating project risks. Tracking metrics on a regular basis will allow you to detect harmful trends early and fix issues while they are still easy to fix.
The Case for Using Metrics
Every industry that creates complex products should use metrics to ensure quality and usability. Modern manufacturing would be unthinkable without stringent quality measurements. In this regard, the software industry is clearly lagging behind other industries, although it would particularly benefit from using such an approach.
The best way to use metrics is setting up a metrics-based feedback loop (see Figure 9-1). Using metrics-based feedback loops guarantees that products meet a measurable standard of quality. Not only does this improve overall quality, but it also improves the software’s maintainability and therefore boosts the productivity of every developer working on the project. Better maintainability makes code easier to read and understand, which also means that developers spend less time reading code and more time improving or adding code.
Figure 9-1. ...
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