Most of today’s dynamic analysis approaches are based on method traces. However, in the case of objectorientation understanding program execution by analyzing method traces is complicated because the behavior of a program depends on the sharing and the transfer of object references (aliasing). We argue that trace-based dynamic analysis is at a too low level of abstraction for objectoriented systems. We propose a new approach that captures the life cycle of objects by explicitly taking into account object aliasing and how aliases propagate during the execution of the program. In this paper, we present in detail our new meta-model and discuss future tracks opened by it. 1

The dynamic analysis approach to feature identification describes a technique for capturing feature behavior and mapping it to source code. Major drawbacks of this approach are (1) large amounts of data and (2) lack of support for sub-method elements. In this paper we propose to leverage sub-method reflection to identify and model features. We perform an on-the-fly analysis resulting in annotating the operations participating in a feature’s behavior with meta-data. The primary advantage of our annotation approach is that we obtain a fine-grained level of granularity while at the same time eliminating the need to retain and analyze large traces for feature analysis.

Language integration is an important issue in the area of software maintenance and reengineering. We describe a novel solution in this area: automatically applied and composed split objects. Split objects provide a language integration that goes beyond simple wrappers by integrating object identity, state, methods, and class hierarchies of entities in two languages to one logical entity. The split object concept can be applied as an aspect-oriented solution, in which an aspect of a system is implemented in another language. After describing these concepts and two split object frameworks that we have implemented, we discuss how split objects can be applied for other maintenance and reengineering tasks than language integration. These application fields include software component testing, dynamic feature analysis, and variation and configuration management.

Abstract. To extract abstract views of the behavior of an object-oriented system for reverse engineering, a body of research exists that analyzes a system’s runtime execution. Those approaches primarily analyze the control flow by tracing method execution events. However, they do not capture information flows. We address this problem by proposing a novel dynamic analysis technique named Object Flow Analysis, which complements method execution tracing with an accurate analysis of the runtime flow of objects. To exemplify the usefulness of our analysis we present a visual approach that allows a system engineer to study classes and components in terms of how they exchange objects at runtime. We illustrate and validate our approach on two case studies. 1