Evaluating the conventional wisdom in clone removal: a genealogy-based empirical study

Authors:
Minhaz F. Zibran;Ripon K. Saha;Chanchal K. Roy;Kevin A. Schneider
Affiliations:
University of Saskatchewan, Canada;University of Texas at Austin;University of Saskatchewan, Canada;University of Saskatchewan, Canada
Venue:
Proceedings of the 28th Annual ACM Symposium on Applied Computing
Year:
2013

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Abstract

Clone management has drawn immense interest from the research community in recent years. It is recognized that a deep understanding of how code clones change and are refactored is necessary for devising effective clone management tools and techniques. This paper presents an empirical study based on the clone genealogies from a significant number of releases of six software systems, to characterize the patterns of clone change and removal in evolving software systems. With a blend of qualitative analysis, quantitative analysis and statistical tests of significance, we address a number of research questions. Our findings reveal insights into the removal of individual clone fragments and provide empirical evidence in support of conventional clone evolution wisdom. The results can be used to devise informed clone management tools and techniques.