The ability to measure attributes of software and the software development process are essential to improvements in the practice of software engineering. However, most who attempt to measure software products and processes are forced to rely on ad hoc or poorly defined measures. Of the many measures of software products defined over the years, very few actually measure what is purported to be measured by them. The focus of this research on software measurement has been on identifying and measuring non-trivial characteristics related to software quality. Much of this work has focused on measuring cohesion in the procedural paradigm and has demonstrated the need for a long-term evolution in the definition of measures when dealing with non-trivial properties. More recent work has included the object-oriented paradigm. Current interests also include more general issues of applying measurement theory to software measurement.
Selected Publications:
Linda M. Ott, Object-Oriented Measurement of Software in J. Marciniak, editor, Encyclopedia of Software Engineering, Wiley, January 2002
Linda Ott, Atte Kinula, Carolyn Seaman, Claes Wohlin. The Role of Empirical Studies in Process Improvement, Empirical Software Engineering 4(4): 381-386, December 1999.
Linda M. Ott and James M. Bieman. Program Slices as an Abstraction for Cohesion Measurement, Information and Software Technology, December 1998.
Linda M. Ott. The Early Days of Software Metrics: Looking Back After 20 Years, in A. Melton, editor, Software Measurement: Understanding Software Engineering, International Thomson Computer Press, 1995.
Linda M. Ott, James M. Bieman, Byung-Kyoo Kang and Bindu Mehra. "Developing Measures of Class Cohesion for Object-Oriented Software," 7th Annual Oregon Workshop on Software Metrics, June 1995.
J. M. Bieman, N. Fenton, D. A. Gustafson, A. Melton, and L. M. Ott. Fundamental Issues in Software Measurement, in A. Melton, editor, Software Measurement: Understanding Software Engineering, International Thomson Computer Press, 1995.
J. M. Bieman and L. M. Ott. "Measuring Functional Cohesion", IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering, August 1994.
Linda M. Ott and Jeffrey J. Thuss. "Slice Based Metrics for Estimating Cohesion," Proc. IEEE-CS International Software Metrics Symposium, Baltimore, May 21-22, 1993.
L. M. Ott. "Using Slice Profiles and Metrics during Software Maintenance," Proc. 10th Annual Software Reliability Symposium, Denver, June 25-26, 1992.
L. M. Ott and J. J. Thuss. "The Relationship between Slices and Module Cohesion," Proc. 11th International Conference on Software Engineering, Pittsburgh, May 15-18, 1989.
Selected Masters' Theses:
Matthew Scaer, "Assessing the Role of Experience in the Estimation of Risk: A Quantitative Approach," M.S. Thesis, 2002.
Christine Reid, " Comparing Defect Detection Techniques," M.S. Thesis, 2002.
Teresa L. Hale, "Examination of Slice Based Cohesion Measures." M.S. Thesis, 1999.
Bindu Mehra. "A Critique of Cohesion Measures in the Object-Oriented Paradigm." M.S. Thesis, 1997.
Jeff Winters. "A Measure of C++ Object-oriented Parametric Const Correctness," M. S. Thesis, 1997.
Sakari Karstu. "An Examination of the Behavior of Slice Based Cohesion Measures." M.S. Thesis, 1994.
Janne A. Leminen. "Slicing and Slice Based Measures for the Assessment of Functional Cohesion of Z Operation Schemas." M.S. Thesis, 1994.