Journal Papers

2024

JSS24
Harmonizing DevOps taxonomies — A grounded theory study

Jessica Díaz, Jorge Pérez, Isaque Alves, Fabio Kon, Leonardo Leite, Paulo Meirelles, and Carla Rocha

Journal of Systems and Software 2024

Abs Bib

Context: DevOps responds to the growing need of companies to streamline the software development process and thus has experienced widespread adoption in the past few years. However, the successful adoption of DevOps requires companies to address important cultural and organizational changes. Nevertheless, it is crucial to recognize that various DevOps taxonomies exist, both from academic and practitioner perspectives, which may lead to misleading or failed adoption of DevOps. Objective: This paper presents empirical research on the structure of DevOps teams in software-producing organizations. The goal is to better understand the organizational structure and characteristics of teams adopting DevOps by harmonizing the existing knowledge. Methods: To achieve this, we employed a grounded theory approach with collaborative coding, involving two research groups. Inter-Coder Agreement (ICA) was utilized to guide the discussion rounds. We conducted a comprehensive analysis of existing studies on DevOps teams and taxonomies to gain a deeper understanding of the subject. Results: From the analysis, we built a substantive and analytic theory of DevOps taxonomies. The theory is substantive in that the scope of validity refers to the ten secondary studies processed and analytic in that it analyzes “what is” rather than explaining causality or attempting predictive generalizations. A public repository with all the data related to the products resulting from the analysis and generation of the theory is available. Conclusions: We built a theory on DevOps taxonomies and tested whether it harmonizes the existing taxonomies, i.e., whether our theory can instantiate the others. This is the first step to define which taxonomies are best suited to approach DevOps culture and practices according to the companies’ objectives and capabilities. Editor’s note: Open Science material was validated by the Journal of Systems and Software Open Science Board.
@article{jss2024_devops, title = {Harmonizing DevOps taxonomies — A grounded theory study}, journal = {Journal of Systems and Software}, volume = {208}, pages = {111908}, year = {2024}, issn = {0164-1212}, doi = {https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jss.2023.111908}, url = {https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0164121223003035}, author = {Díaz, Jessica and Pérez, Jorge and Alves, Isaque and Kon, Fabio and Leite, Leonardo and Meirelles, Paulo and Rocha, Carla}, }

IEEE24

Practices for Managing Machine Learning Products: A Multivocal Literature Review

Isaque Alves, Leonardo A. F. Leite, Paulo Meirelles, Fabio Kon, and Carla Silva Rocha Aguiar

IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management 2024

Bib

@article{TEM_mlproducts,
  author = {Alves, Isaque and Leite, Leonardo A. F. and Meirelles, Paulo and Kon, Fabio and Aguiar, Carla Silva Rocha},
  journal = {IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management},
  title = {Practices for Managing Machine Learning Products: A Multivocal Literature Review},
  year = {2024},
  volume = {71},
  number = {},
  pages = {7425-7455},
  keywords = {Software;Data models;Standards organizations;Organizations;Bibliographies;Production;Solution design;Machine learning (ML);management of scientists and engineers;multivocal literature review (MLR);practices;product life cycle;software engineering},
  doi = {10.1109/TEM.2023.3287759},
}

2023

IST23
CADV: A software visualization approach for code annotations distribution

Phyllipe Lima, Jorge Melegati, Everaldo Gomes, Nathalya Stefhany Pereira, Eduardo Guerra, and Paulo Meirelles

Information and Software Technology 2023

Abs Bib

Context: Code annotations is a widely used feature in Java systems to configure custom metadata on programming elements. Their increasing presence creates the need for approaches to assess and comprehend their usage and distribution. In this context, software visualization has been studied and researched to improve program comprehension in different aspects. Objectives: This study aimed at designing a software visualization approach that graphically displays how code annotations are distributed and organized in a software system and developing a tool, as a reference implementation of the approach, to generate views and interact with users.Methods: We conducted an empirical evaluation through questionnaires and interviews to evaluate our visualization approach considering four aspects: (i) effectiveness for program comprehension, (ii) perceived usefulness, (iv) perceived ease of use, and (iv) suitability for the intended audience. The resulting data was used to perform a qualitative and quantitative analysis. Results: The tool identifies package responsibilities providing visual information about their annotations at different levels. Using the developed tool, the participants achieved a high correctness rate in the program comprehension tasks and performed very well in questions about the overview of the system under analysis. Finally, participants perceived that the tool is suitable to visualize the distribution of code annotations. Conclusions: The results show that the visualization approach using the developed tool is effective in program comprehension tasks related to code annotations, which can also be used to identify responsibilities in the application packages. Moreover, it was evaluated as suitable for newcomers to overview the usage of annotations in the system and for architects to perform a deep analysis that can potentially detect misplaced annotations and abnormal growths on their usage.
@article{LIMA2023107089, journal = {Information and Software Technology}, volume = {154}, pages = {107089}, year = {2023}, issn = {0950-5849}, doi = {https://doi.org/10.1016/j.infsof.2022.107089}, url = {https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0950584922001987}, author = {Lima, Phyllipe and Melegati, Jorge and Gomes, Everaldo and Pereira, Nathalya Stefhany and Guerra, Eduardo and Meirelles, Paulo}, keywords = {Code annotations, Circle packing, Empirical evaluation, Software visualization}, }
SF23
Annotation Visualizer: A software visualization tool for code annotations

Phyllipe Lima, Nathalya Stefhany Pereira, Everaldo Gomes, Eduardo Guerra, and Paulo Meirelles

Software Impacts 2023

Abs Bib

The Annotation Visualizer (AVisualizer) is a software visualization tool for displaying code annotations distribution in a given target Java-based software system. Implemented as a web application, it can extract annotations usage from the target source code and display it using a hierarchical circle packing approach. Using a dedicated suite of software metrics, it can display size-related information and code responsibilities associated with annotations usage. The tool provides three different views of the analyzed system, each with different granularity. The AVisualizer is a tool that helps improve code comprehension.
@article{LIMA2023100491, journal = {Software Impacts}, volume = {16}, pages = {100491}, year = {2023}, issn = {2665-9638}, doi = {https://doi.org/10.1016/j.simpa.2023.100491}, url = {https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2665963823000283}, author = {Lima, Phyllipe and Pereira, Nathalya Stefhany and Gomes, Everaldo and Guerra, Eduardo and Meirelles, Paulo}, keywords = {Code annotations, Circle packing, Web application, Software visualization, Open-source tool}, }

IEEE23

A Theory of Organizational Structures for Development and Infrastructure Professionals

Leonardo Leite, Nelson Lago, Claudia Melo, Fabio Kon, and Paulo Meirelles

IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering 2023

Bib

@article{9864071,
  author = {Leite, Leonardo and Lago, Nelson and Melo, Claudia and Kon, Fabio and Meirelles, Paulo},
  journal = {IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering},
  title = {A Theory of Organizational Structures for Development and Infrastructure Professionals},
  year = {2023},
  volume = {49},
  number = {4},
  pages = {1898-1911},
  keywords = {Companies;Taxonomy;Software;Interviews;Periodic structures;Industries;Software engineering;DevOps;software teams;organizational structures;continuous delivery;software engineering;grounded theory},
  doi = {10.1109/TSE.2022.3199169},
}

2021

IST21
The organization of software teams in the quest for continuous delivery: A grounded theory approach

Leonardo Leite, Gustavo Pinto, Fabio Kon, and Paulo Meirelles

Information and Software Technology 2021

Abs Bib

Context: To accelerate time-to-market and improve customer satisfaction, software-producing organizations have adopted continuous delivery practices, impacting the relations between development and infrastructure professionals. Yet, no substantial literature has substantially tackled how the software industry structures the organization of development and infrastructure teams. Objective: In this study, we investigate how software-producing organizations structure their development and infrastructure teams, specifically how is the division of labor among these groups and how they interact. Method: After brainstorming with 7 DevOps experts to better formulate our research and procedures, we collected and analyzed data from 37 semi-structured interviews with IT professionals, following Grounded Theory guidelines. Results: After a careful analysis, we identified four common organizational structures: (1) siloed departments, (2) classical DevOps, (3) cross-functional teams, and (4) platform teams. We also observed that some companies are transitioning between these structures. Conclusion: The main contribution of this study is a theory in the form of a taxonomy that organizes the found structures along with their properties. This theory could guide researchers and practitioners to think about how to better structure development and infrastructure professionals in software-producing organizations.
@article{LEITE2021106672, title = {The organization of software teams in the quest for continuous delivery: A grounded theory approach}, journal = {Information and Software Technology}, volume = {139}, pages = {106672}, year = {2021}, issn = {0950-5849}, doi = {https://doi.org/10.1016/j.infsof.2021.106672}, url = {https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0950584921001324}, author = {Leite, Leonardo and Pinto, Gustavo and Kon, Fabio and Meirelles, Paulo}, keywords = {DevOps, Continuous delivery, Release process, Software teams}, }

POFI21

Interactive Web Maps: Usability Heuristics Proposal

J. O. Marquez, P. Meirelles, and T. S. Silva

Proceedings of the ICA 2021

Bib

@article{ica-proc-4-70-2021,
  author = {Marquez, J. O. and Meirelles, P. and da Silva, T. S.},
  title = {Interactive Web Maps: Usability Heuristics Proposal},
  journal = {Proceedings of the ICA},
  volume = {4},
  year = {2021},
  pages = {70},
  url = {https://ica-proc.copernicus.org/articles/4/70/2021/},
  doi = {10.5194/ica-proc-4-70-2021},
}

IEEE21

Improving Parallelism in Git and GNU Compiler Collection: Strategies, Difficulties, and Lessons Learned

Matheus Tavares Bernardino, Giuliano Belinassi, Paulo Meirelles, Eduardo Martins Guerra, and Alfredo Goldman

IEEE Software 2021

Bib

@article{9184254,
  author = {Bernardino, Matheus Tavares and Belinassi, Giuliano and Meirelles, Paulo and Guerra, Eduardo Martins and Goldman, Alfredo},
  journal = {IEEE Software},
  title = {Improving Parallelism in Git and GNU Compiler Collection: Strategies, Difficulties, and Lessons Learned},
  year = {2021},
  volume = {38},
  number = {5},
  pages = {92-100},
  keywords = {Optimization;Parallel processing;Instruction sets;Open source software;Performance evaluation;parallelism and concurrency;parallel systems;compilers;version control;GCC;Git;conversion from sequential to parallel forms},
  doi = {10.1109/MS.2020.3020932},
}

2020

JSS20
Leading successful government-academia collaborations using FLOSS and agile values

Melissa Wen, Rodrigo Siqueira, Nelson Lago, Diego Camarinha, Antonio Terceiro, Fabio Kon, and Paulo Meirelles

Journal of Systems and Software 2020

Abs Bib

Government and academia share concerns for efficiently and effectively servicing societal demands, which includes the development of e-government software. Government-academia partnerships can be a valuable approach for improving productivity in achieving these goals. However, governmental and academic institutions tend to have very different agendas and organizational and managerial structures, which can hinder the success of such collaborative projects. In order to identify effective approaches to overcome collaboration barriers, we systematically studied the case of the Brazilian Public Software portal project, a 30-month government-academia collaboration that, using Free/Libre/Open Source Software practices and agile methods for project management, developed an unprecedented platform in the context of the Brazilian government. We gathered information from experience reports and data collection from repositories and interviews to derive a collection of practices that contributed to the success of the collaboration. In this paper, we describe how the data analysis led to the identification of a set of three high-level decisions supported by the adoption of nine best practices that improved the project performance and enabled professional training of the whole team.
@article{WEN2020110548, title = {Leading successful government-academia collaborations using FLOSS and agile values}, journal = {Journal of Systems and Software}, volume = {164}, pages = {110548}, year = {2020}, issn = {0164-1212}, doi = {https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jss.2020.110548}, url = {https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0164121220300303}, author = {Wen, Melissa and Siqueira, Rodrigo and Lago, Nelson and Camarinha, Diego and Terceiro, Antonio and Kon, Fabio and Meirelles, Paulo}, keywords = {Project management, Government-Academia collaboration, Free software, Open source software, Agile methodologies, e-Government}, }

2019

ACM19
A Survey of DevOps Concepts and Challenges

Leonardo Leite, Carla Rocha, Fabio Kon, Dejan Milojicic, and Paulo Meirelles

ACM Comput. Surv. Nov 2019

Abs Bib

DevOpsis a collaborative and multidisciplinary organizational effort to automate continuous delivery of new software updates while guaranteeing their correctness and reliability. The present survey investigates and discusses DevOps challenges from the perspective of engineers, managers, and researchers. We review the literature and develop a DevOps conceptual map, correlating the DevOps automation tools with these concepts. We then discuss their practical implications for engineers, managers, and researchers. Finally, we critically explore some of the most relevant DevOps challenges reported by the literature.
@article{10.1145/3359981, author = {Leite, Leonardo and Rocha, Carla and Kon, Fabio and Milojicic, Dejan and Meirelles, Paulo}, title = {A Survey of DevOps Concepts and Challenges}, year = {2019}, issue_date = {November 2020}, publisher = {Association for Computing Machinery}, address = {New York, NY, USA}, volume = {52}, number = {6}, issn = {0360-0300}, url = {https://doi.org/10.1145/3359981}, doi = {10.1145/3359981}, journal = {ACM Comput. Surv.}, month = nov, articleno = {127}, numpages = {35}, keywords = {DevOps, and build process, configuration management, continuous (delivery, deployment, integration), release process, versioning}, }

2018

JSS18
A Metrics Suite for code annotation assessment

Phyllipe Lima, Eduardo Guerra, Paulo Meirelles, Lucas Kanashiro, Hélio Silva, and Fábio Fagundes Silveira

Journal of Systems and Software Nov 2018

Abs Bib

Code annotation is a language feature that enables the introduction of custom metadata on programming elements. In Java, this feature was introduced on version 5, and today it is widely used by main enterprise application frameworks and APIs. Although this language feature potentially simplifies metadata configuration, its abuse and misuse can reduce source code readability and complicate its maintenance. The goal of this paper is to propose software metrics regarding annotations in the source code and analyze their distribution in real-world projects. We have defined a suite of metrics to assess characteristics of the usage of source code annotations in a code base. Our study collected data from 24947 classes extracted from open source projects to analyze the distribution of the proposed metrics. We developed a tool to automatically extract the metrics and provide a full report on annotations usage. Based on the analysis of the distribution, we defined an appropriate approach for the calculation of thresholds to interpret the metric values. The results allow the assessment of annotated code characteristics. Using the thresholds values, we proposed a way to interpret the use of annotations, which can reveal potential problems in the source code.
@article{LIMA2018163, journal = {Journal of Systems and Software}, volume = {137}, pages = {163-183}, year = {2018}, issn = {0164-1212}, doi = {https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jss.2017.11.024}, url = {https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S016412121730273X}, author = {Lima, Phyllipe and Guerra, Eduardo and Meirelles, Paulo and Kanashiro, Lucas and Silva, Hélio and Silveira, Fábio Fagundes}, keywords = {Code annotation, Software metrics, Thresholds}, }

IEEE18

Continuous Delivery: Building Trust in a Large-Scale, Complex Government Organization

Rodrigo Siqueira, Diego Camarinha, Melissa Wen, Paulo Meirelles, and Fabio Kon

IEEE Software Nov 2018

Bib

@article{8255783,
  author = {Siqueira, Rodrigo and Camarinha, Diego and Wen, Melissa and Meirelles, Paulo and Kon, Fabio},
  journal = {IEEE Software},
  title = {Continuous Delivery: Building Trust in a Large-Scale, Complex Government Organization},
  year = {2018},
  volume = {35},
  number = {2},
  pages = {38-43},
  keywords = {Software development management;Software product lines;Product life cycle management;Software engineeirng;continuous delivery;software release management;configuration management;software engineering;government applications;agile software development;software development},
  doi = {10.1109/MS.2018.111095426},
}

2008

IEEE08

A High-Fault-Coverage Approach for the Test of Data, Control and Handshake Interconnects in Mesh Networks-on-Chip

Érika Cota, Fernanda Lima Kastensmidt, Maico Cassel, Marcos Hervé, Pedro Almeida, Paulo Meirelles, Alexandre Amory, and Marcelo Lubaszewski

IEEE Transactions on Computers Nov 2008

Bib

@article{4487057,
  author = {Cota, Érika and Kastensmidt, Fernanda Lima and Cassel, Maico and Hervé, Marcos and Almeida, Pedro and Meirelles, Paulo and Amory, Alexandre and Lubaszewski, Marcelo},
  journal = {IEEE Transactions on Computers},
  title = {A High-Fault-Coverage Approach for the Test of Data, Control and Handshake Interconnects in Mesh Networks-on-Chip},
  year = {2008},
  volume = {57},
  number = {9},
  pages = {1202-1215},
  keywords = {Interconnections (Subsystems);Reliability;Testing;and Fault-Tolerance;Interconnections (Subsystems);Reliability;Testing;and Fault-Tolerance},
  doi = {10.1109/TC.2008.62},
}