icsm2011 syer
TRANSCRIPT
Exploring the Development of Micro-Apps
Mark D. Syer, Bram Adams, Ying Zou and Ahmed E. Hassan
[email protected] Analysis and Intelligence Lab
Queen’s University, Canada
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Huge number of apps
2
Ava
ilabl
e A
pps
(000
’s)
+244%
+150%
+70%
All users want the same apps
4 of the top 5 apps are common to all platforms .
3
Given the same app on two different platforms, how do they compare?
4
Code Dependency Churn
Which platform requires more
development effort?
Which platform requires more
maintenance effort?
Which platform provides more
support?
Popular Mobile App Platforms
5
WordPressGoogle Authenticator
Facebook SDK
Functionally Equivalent App Pairs
Android apps are smaller
6
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
35
40
Facebook SDK Google Authenticator Wordpress
AndroidBlackBerry
Line
s of
Cod
e (th
ousa
nds)
7
Code Dependency Churn
Which platform requires more
development effort?
Which platform requires more
maintenance effort?
Which platform provides more
support?
Types of micro app dependencies
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Unique Code Base Third Party Libraryfoo
bar
main
JAVA APIsAndroid or BlackBerry APIs
Platform DependenciesJAVA
Dependencies
Unique DependenciesThird Party
Dependencies
Android apps depend on platform
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10
Code Dependency Churn
Which platform requires more
development effort?
Which platform requires more
maintenance effort?
Which platform provides more
support?
but, more third party libraries
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2009 2010 2011
Constantly Growing Code Base
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Code Dependency Churn
Which platform requires more
development effort?
Which platform requires more
maintenance effort?
Which platform provides more
support?
but, more third party libraries
Discussion
• Platform support:– Good? additional features and functionality
reduces development effort– Bad? high platform dependency leads to lock-in
and increases the effort of porting• How do micro apps compare to desktop
applications?• How does adoption/migration of platform
dependencies vary o13