Introducing TDD on a free libre open source software project: a simulation experiment

  • Authors:
  • Ivana Turnu;Marco Melis;Alessandra Cau;Michele Marchesi;Alessio Setzu

  • Affiliations:
  • Università di Cagliari, Cagliari, Italy;Università di Cagliari, Cagliari, Italy;Università di Cagliari, Cagliari, Italy;Università di Cagliari, Cagliari, Italy;Università di Cagliari, Cagliari, Italy

  • Venue:
  • Proceedings of the 2004 workshop on Quantitative techniques for software agile process
  • Year:
  • 2004

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Abstract

This paper describes a simulation model that represents the first step to modeling open source software development processes. The model has been tuned using data from a real FLOSS project: Apache. The goal of our research is to show the effects of adopting TDD (Test Driven Development) on our open source simulation model. In order to introduce the TDD practice, we have only changed some parameter values in the FLOSS simulation model. In particular, the average time required to write a line of production code increases because now automated tests are also coded, the number of defects injected during coding decreases as does the debugging time to fix a single defect. The two FLOSS development models (nonTDD and TDD) have been compared, the one incorporating the agile practice of Test Driven Development yielding better results in terms of code quality (defects/Kloc).