MDD vs. traditional software development: A practitioner’s subjective perspective

Abstract

Abstract.Context: Today practitioners have a myriad of methods from which to choose for the development of software applications. However they lack empirical data that characterize these methods in terms of usefulness, ease of use or compatibility, all of them relevant variables to assess the developer's intention to use them. OBJECTIVE: To compare three methods, each following a different paradigm (Model-Driven, Model-Based and the traditional, code-centric, respectively) with respect to its intention to use by junior software developers while developing the business layer of a Web 2.0 application. METHOD: We have conducted an experiment with 26 graduate students of the University of Alicante. The application developed was a Social Network, which was organized in three different modules. Subjects were asked to use a different method for each one of the three modules, and then answer a questionnaire that gathered their perceptions during its use. RESULTS: The results show that the method that followed the Model-Driven development paradigm is regarded as the most useful, although it is also regarded as the more difficult to use. They also show that junior software developers feel comfortable with the use of models, and are likely to use them if accompanied by a model-driven development environment. CONCLUSIONS: Model-driven development methods seem to show a great potential for adoption. However, further experimentation is needed to be able to generalize the results to a different population, different methods, languages and tools, different domains or different application sizes.

Comparison of a textual versus a graphical notation for the maintainability of MDE domain models: an empirical pilot study

“…In previous works, it has been empirically proven how the use of models in the context of a model-driven approach has a positive impact on efficiency and effectiveness of maintenance tasks [22], and also on developer's satisfaction [23]. In these experiments, results of performing the maintainability tasks using models were compared with the results of performing the same tasks directly on code.…”

Empirical study on the maintainability of Web applications: Model-driven Engineering vs Code-centric

“…This happens even though OOH4RIA includes a checking mechanism that is aimed at helping developers to avoid the introduction of unnoticed errors (a mechanism that was not available for the .NET treatment). We believe that this may be due to the perceived loss of control with MDE approaches that subjects have reported in a related study [38]. Also, subjects believe that OOH4RIA is slightly more learnable and less complex than .NET (although, again, not significantly).…”

“…We expected subjects to be significantly more satisfied with OOH4RIA, given the expected gains in e ciency and e↵ectiveness. Again, based on self-reported opinions disclosed in a previous experiment [38], we believe that this lower level of satisfaction (despite the increased objective and subjective productivity gains) may be due to code-centric practices being more consistent with the existing values, needs and past experiences of subjects, which suggests the convenience to introduce this variable in future replications of the experiment.…”

“…The dependent (measurable) variables (DV) have been defined based on a wellknown Method Adoption Model [47], which is rooted in sound evidence from related fields [48], and has been further refined in [38]. This model is presented in Fig.…”

gestUI: a model-driven method for including gesture-based interaction in user interfaces

“…Results show that MDD approaches are the most difficult to use but, at the same time, are considered as the most suitable in long term. Additionally, these authors in [109] report a quasi-experiment in order to evaluate productivity and satisfaction when a group of Master students develop a Web application using three methods: code-centric, model-based (UML) and model-driven (OOH4RIA). Results show that the use of Model-driven Engineering practices significantly increase both productivity and satisfaction of junior Web developers, regardless of the particular application.…”