期刊名称:Journal of Software Engineering and Applications
印刷版ISSN:1945-3116
电子版ISSN:1945-3124
出版年度:2011
卷号:4
期号:1
页码:48-58
DOI:10.4236/jsea.2011.41006
出版社:Scientific Research Publishing
摘要:Reusing programs and other artifacts has been shown to be an effective strategy for significant reduction of development costs. This article reports on a survey of 128 developers to explore their experiences and perceptions about using other people’s code: to what extent does the “not invented here” attitude exist? The survey was structured around a novel and simple “4A” model, which is introduced in this article: for an organization to obtain any benefits from reusing code, four conditions must obtain: availability, awareness, accessibility, and acceptability. The greatest impediments to reuse were shown to be awareness of reusable code and developers’ perceptions of its acceptability for use on their new projects. For 72% of developers, the complexity of the old code was cited as a reason that the code was not reused. The survey also included developers’ suggestions for ways to take greater advantage of existing code and related artifacts.