28th Annual International Computer Software and Applications Conference (COMPSAC'04)
A Taxonomy and Hierarchy of Variability Dependencies in Software Product Family Engineering
Hong Kong
September 28-September 30
ISBN: 0-7695-2209-2
In a software product family context, software architects design architectures that support product diversification in both space (multiple contexts) and time (changing contexts). Product diversification is based on the concept of variability: a single architecture and a set of components support a family of products. Software product families have to support increasing amounts of variability, but variability dependencies are often ill-defined and have unexpected or even unknown behavior. This paper suggests a (1) taxonomy and a (2) hierarchy of variability dependencies in a software product family context. The taxonomy is based on the concept of variation points and identifies four main types of variability dependencies. The four-tier hierarchy is a generalization of the architectural layers found in the so-called Building Block Method.
Citation:
Michel Jaring, Jan Bosch, "A Taxonomy and Hierarchy of Variability Dependencies in Software Product Family Engineering," compsac, vol. 1, pp.356-361, 28th Annual International Computer Software and Applications Conference (COMPSAC'04), 2004