Program Understanding

Catalog description

Techniques for the analysis and visualization of large software systems to assess the quality of the design and architecture. SWENG 588 Program Understanding (3)It is a general observation that software engineers learn about software design, programming languages, paradigms, patterns and tools, and are expected to produce high quality designs and code, often without ever having seen good examples. This approach is akin to teaching students the syntax of the English language and writing techniques and then expecting them to become expert writers without ever having read great literary works. The course in Program Understanding seeks to educate graduate software engineering students beyond their understanding of code syntax and best construction practices with analytical evaluation of "great works" of software code. This approach includes manual code reading, the use of visualization techniques, and automated approaches to assessment of design and code quality.