A Metric Extraction Framework Based on a High-Level Description Language

Nowadays, many tools are available for metric extraction. However, extending these tools with new metrics or modifying the calculation of existing ones is often difficult, sometimes impossible. Indeed, many of them are black box tools. Others can be extended only by modifying third-party code. Moreover, metric specifications often lack precision, which leads to implementations that do not correspond necessarily to users’ expectations. In this paper, we propose a flexible approach for metric collection based on a metric description language that allows manipulating basic data extracted from the code. These data are mapped to a generic object-oriented meta-model that is language agnostic. This makes it easy to focus on the metric specification rather than language specific constructs. Metric specifications are interpreted automatically to extract their corresponding values for a target program.