Identifying relevant change sets to facilitate change impact analysis

Abstract

Conducting a change impact analysis may prove to be a difficult and costly endeavor. Estimating the potential effects a change would have on the system is essential in nowadays software development where the project budget and deadlines are paying an important role. An inaccurate estimation could lead to a potential failure in the project or delay in the release of the software. But the process of change impact analysis itself also costs resources to conduct. The study observes whether the process of change impact analysis can be improved in terms of time spent and errors made by using a traceability graphical representation and hiding irrelevant trace links on a system level, based on a cross-cutting approach proposed by [1].