TY - JOUR A1 - Steinert, Bastian A1 - Thamsen, Lauritz A1 - Felgentreff, Tim A1 - Hirschfeld, Robert T1 - Object Versioning to Support Recovery Needs Using Proxies to Preserve Previous Development States in Lively JF - ACM SIGPLAN notices N2 - We present object versioning as a generic approach to preserve access to previous development and application states. Version-aware references can manage the modifications made to the target object and record versions as desired. Such references can be provided without modifications to the virtual machine. We used proxies to implement the proposed concepts and demonstrate the Lively Kernel running on top of this object versioning layer. This enables Lively users to undo the effects of direct manipulation and other programming actions. KW - Programming Environments KW - Object Versioning KW - CoExist KW - JavaScript KW - Lively Kernel Y1 - 2015 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1145/2661088.2661093 SN - 0362-1340 SN - 1558-1160 VL - 50 IS - 2 SP - 113 EP - 124 PB - Association for Computing Machinery CY - New York ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Pape, Tobias A1 - Felgentreff, Tim A1 - Hirschfeld, Robert A1 - Gulenko, Anton A1 - Bolz, Carl Friedrich T1 - Language-independent Storage Strategies for Tracing-JIT-based Virtual Machines JF - ACM SIGPLAN notices N2 - Storage strategies have been proposed as a run-time optimization for the PyPy Python implementation and have shown promising results for optimizing execution speed and memory requirements. However, it remained unclear whether the approach works equally well in other dynamic languages. Furthermore, while PyPy is based on RPython, a language to write VMs with reusable components such as a tracing just-in-time compiler and garbage collection, the strategies design itself was not generalized to be reusable across languages implemented using that same toolchain. In this paper, we present a general design and implementation for storage strategies and show how they can be reused across different RPython-based languages. We evaluate the performance of our implementation for RSqueak, an RPython-based VM for Squeak/Smalltalk and show that storage strategies may indeed off er performance benefits for certain workloads in other dynamic programming languages. We furthermore evaluate the generality of our implementation by applying it to Topaz, a Ruby VM, and Pycket, a Racket implementation. KW - Implementation KW - collection types KW - memory optimization KW - dynamic typing Y1 - 2016 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1145/2816707.2816716 SN - 0362-1340 SN - 1558-1160 VL - 51 SP - 104 EP - 113 PB - Association for Computing Machinery CY - New York ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Rein, Patrick A1 - Ramson, Stefan A1 - Lincke, Jens A1 - Felgentreff, Tim A1 - Hirschfeld, Robert T1 - Group-Based Behavior Adaptation Mechanisms in Object-Oriented Systems JF - IEEE software N2 - Dynamic and distributed systems require behavior adaptations for groups of objects. Group-based behavior adaptation mechanisms scope adaptations to objects matching conditions beyond class membership. The specification of groups can be explicit or implicit. KW - group-based behavior adaptation KW - lively groups KW - ContextErlang KW - entity-component-system KW - predicated generic functions KW - active layers KW - reactive object queries KW - context groups KW - implied methods KW - object-oriented languages KW - software engineering KW - software development KW - contextual-variability modeling Y1 - 2017 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1109/MS.2017.4121224 SN - 0740-7459 SN - 1937-4194 VL - 34 IS - 6 SP - 78 EP - 82 PB - Inst. of Electr. and Electronics Engineers CY - Los Alamitos ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Perscheid, Michael A1 - Siegmund, Benjamin A1 - Taeumel, Marcel A1 - Hirschfeld, Robert T1 - Studying the advancement in debugging practice of professional software developers JF - Software Quality Journal N2 - In 1997, Henry Lieberman stated that debugging is the dirty little secret of computer science. Since then, several promising debugging technologies have been developed such as back-in-time debuggers and automatic fault localization methods. However, the last study about the state-of-the-art in debugging is still more than 15 years old and so it is not clear whether these new approaches have been applied in practice or not. For that reason, we investigate the current state of debugging in a comprehensive study. First, we review the available literature and learn about current approaches and study results. Second, we observe several professional developers while debugging and interview them about their experiences. Third, we create a questionnaire that serves as the basis for a larger online debugging survey. Based on these results, we present new insights into debugging practice that help to suggest new directions for future research. KW - Debugging KW - Literature review KW - Field study KW - Online survey Y1 - 2016 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1007/s11219-015-9294-2 SN - 0963-9314 SN - 1573-1367 VL - 25 SP - 83 EP - 110 PB - Springer CY - Dordrecht ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Felgentreff, Tim A1 - Perscheid, Michael A1 - Hirschfeld, Robert T1 - Implementing record and refinement for debugging timing-dependent communication JF - Science of computer programming N2 - Distributed applications are hard to debug because timing-dependent network communication is a source of non-deterministic behavior. Current approaches to debug non deterministic failures include post-mortem debugging as well as record and replay. However, the first impairs system performance to gather data, whereas the latter requires developers to understand the timing-dependent communication at a lower level of abstraction than they develop at. Furthermore, both approaches require intrusive core library modifications to gather data from live systems. In this paper, we present the Peek-At-Talk debugger for investigating non-deterministic failures with low overhead in a systematic, top-down method, with a particular focus on tool-building issues in the following areas: First, we show how our debugging framework Path Tools guides developers from failures to their root causes and gathers run-time data with low overhead. Second, we present Peek-At-Talk, an extension to our Path Tools framework to record non-deterministic communication and refine behavioral data that connects source code with network events. Finally, we scope changes to the core library to record network communication without impacting other network applications. KW - Distributed debugging KW - Record and replay KW - Dynamic analysis KW - Record and refinement Y1 - 2016 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scico.2015.11.006 SN - 0167-6423 SN - 1872-7964 VL - 134 SP - 4 EP - 18 PB - Elsevier CY - Amsterdam ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Rein, Patrick A1 - Taeumel, Marcel A1 - Hirschfeld, Robert T1 - Making the domain tangible BT - implicit object lookup for source code readability JF - Design Thinking Research N2 - Programmers collaborate continuously with domain experts to explore the problem space and to shape a solution that fits the users’ needs. In doing so, all parties develop a shared vocabulary, which is above all a list of named concepts and their relationships to each other. Nowadays, many programmers favor object-oriented programming because it allows them to directly represent real-world concepts and interactions from the vocabulary as code. However, when existing domain data is not yet represented as objects, it becomes a challenge to initially bring existing domain data into object-oriented systems and to keep the source code readable. While source code might be comprehensible to programmers, domain experts can struggle, given their non-programming background. We present a new approach to provide a mapping of existing data sources into the object-oriented programming environment. We support keeping the code of the domain model compact and readable while adding implicit means to access external information as internal domain objects. This should encourage programmers to explore different ways to build the software system quickly. Eventually, our approach fosters communication with the domain experts, especially at the beginning of a project. When the details in the problem space are not yet clear, the source code provides a valuable, tangible communication artifact. KW - Source Code Readability KW - Domain Objects KW - StackOverflow KW - Squeak KW - Custom Writable Class Y1 - 2017 SN - 978-3-319-60967-6 SN - 978-3-319-60966-9 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-60967-6_9 SP - 171 EP - 194 PB - Springer CY - New York ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Pape, Tobias A1 - Bolz, Carl Friedrich A1 - Hirschfeld, Robert T1 - Adaptive just-in-time value class optimization for lowering memory consumption and improving execution time performance JF - Science of computer programming N2 - The performance of value classes is highly dependent on how they are represented in the virtual machine. Value class instances are immutable, have no identity, and can only refer to other value objects or primitive values and since they should be very lightweight and fast, it is important to optimize them carefully. In this paper we present a technique to detect and compress common patterns of value class usage to improve memory usage and performance. The technique identifies patterns of frequent value object references and introduces abbreviated forms for them. This allows to store multiple inter-referenced value objects in an inlined memory representation, reducing the overhead stemming from meta data and object references. Applied to a small prototype and an implementation of the Racket language, we found improvements in memory usage and execution time for several micro-benchmarks. (C) 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. KW - Meta-tracing KW - JIT KW - Data structure optimization KW - Value classes Y1 - 2017 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scico.2016.08.003 SN - 0167-6423 SN - 1872-7964 VL - 140 SP - 17 EP - 29 PB - Elsevier CY - Amsterdam ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Mattis, Toni A1 - Beckmann, Tom A1 - Rein, Patrick A1 - Hirschfeld, Robert T1 - First-class concepts BT - Reified architectural knowledge beyond dominant decompositions JF - Journal of object technology : JOT / ETH Zürich, Department of Computer Science N2 - Ideally, programs are partitioned into independently maintainable and understandable modules. As a system grows, its architecture gradually loses the capability to accommodate new concepts in a modular way. While refactoring is expensive and not always possible, and the programming language might lack dedicated primary language constructs to express certain cross-cutting concerns, programmers are still able to explain and delineate convoluted concepts through secondary means: code comments, use of whitespace and arrangement of code, documentation, or communicating tacit knowledge.
Secondary constructs are easy to change and provide high flexibility in communicating cross-cutting concerns and other concepts among programmers. However, such secondary constructs usually have no reified representation that can be explored and manipulated as first-class entities through the programming environment.
In this exploratory work, we discuss novel ways to express a wide range of concepts, including cross-cutting concerns, patterns, and lifecycle artifacts independently of the dominant decomposition imposed by an existing architecture. We propose the representation of concepts as first-class objects inside the programming environment that retain the capability to change as easily as code comments. We explore new tools that allow programmers to view, navigate, and change programs based on conceptual perspectives. In a small case study, we demonstrate how such views can be created and how the programming experience changes from draining programmers' attention by stretching it across multiple modules toward focusing it on cohesively presented concepts. Our designs are geared toward facilitating multiple secondary perspectives on a system to co-exist in symbiosis with the original architecture, hence making it easier to explore, understand, and explain complex contexts and narratives that are hard or impossible to express using primary modularity constructs. KW - software engineering KW - modularity KW - exploratory programming KW - program KW - comprehension KW - remodularization KW - architecture recovery Y1 - 2022 U6 - https://doi.org/10.5381/jot.2022.21.2.a6 SN - 1660-1769 VL - 21 IS - 2 SP - 1 EP - 15 PB - ETH Zürich, Department of Computer Science CY - Zürich ER -