Software metrics

A metric is a unit of measure, eg.

• lines of source code
• number of screens and reports
• number of entities, how many attributes and relationships

Needed

• as a basis for comparison with other projects
• to help with expert judgement, analogy or theoretical formulae
• eg. this project has only slightly fewer function points, so it should take nearly as long to complete
• to record progress
• eg. 75% of the database and 47% of the screens have been completed
• to monitor errors
• eg. fewer than average errors have been found in this suite of programs

Software metrics

"I often say that

when you cannot measure what you are speaking about,

when you cannot express it in numbers,

your knowledge is of a meagre and unsatisfactory kind;

it may be the beginning of knowledge, but you have scarcely in your thoughts advanced to the stage of science ..."

Lord Kelvin, addressing the Institution of Civil Engineers in 1883

Other topics

Comments please to: dwfarthi@glam.ac.uk

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