Open AccessWhat Works and What Does Not: an Analysis of Application Frameworks Technology
Author(s) -
Wusheng Zhang,
Mik Kim
Publication year - 2006
Publication title -
journal of business systems, governance and ethics
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
ISSN - 1833-4318
DOI - 10.15209/jbsge.v1i3.82
Subject(s) - reuse , interoperability , computer science , reusability , software deployment , correctness , quality (philosophy) , software development , software engineering , software , engineering management , risk analysis (engineering) , systems engineering , process management , engineering , business , world wide web , philosophy , epistemology , programming language , waste management
Advocates of application frameworks claim that this technology is one of the most promising, supporting large-scale reuse, increased productivity and quality, and reduced cost of software development. A number of its advocates suggest that the next decade will be a major challenge for the development and deployment of this technology. This study investigates the theory and practice of application frameworks technology to evaluate what works and what does not in systems development. The evaluation is based on quality criteria developed by the authors. The result of the study suggests that application frameworks technology does support large-scale reuse by incorporating other existing reuse techniques such as design patterns, class libraries and components. It also shows that the methodological support pertaining to building and implementing application frameworks is inadequate. Furthermore, it indicates that application frameworks technology may increase the quality of software in terms of correctness and reusability with some penalty factors but there is no guarantee of increasing the extendability and interoperability of software systems. There are still obstacles that restrict the potential benefits claimed by the proponents of application frameworks.