Linking the Effect of Typographical Style to the Evolvabililty of Software

This paper presents the problem of program comprehension and its relationship with programming style. It defines programming style as those characteristics of source code associated with formatting and commenting (i.e. typographical style [1]). The paper also outlines a position whose ultimate aim is to support the software evolution process through maintaining comprehensibility. This aim could be achieved by managing the cost of increasing code comprehensibility (in terms of deviation from a base programming style), through the application of groomative maintenance [2].

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