| Almost three decades ago, while teaching at Toronto’s York University, serendipity struck me in the form of frame technology. Frustrated at having to reedit my customizations over and over each time I reused my code generators, I became determined to automate the splicing process. I soon discovered I had a tiger by the tail. Tigers are powerful and hard to tame. Regarding power, frames turn out to greatly alleviate many persistent software engineering concerns, including development productivity, system quality, and maintainability. As to taming this tiger, I’m still learning what gives the technology its power.
With software maintenance costs averaging 50% of total computing costs, it is necessary to have an effective maintenance program in place. Aging legacy systems, for example, pose an especially rough challenge as veteran programmers retire and their successors are left to figure out how the systems operate. This book explores program analyzers, reverse engineering tools, and reengineering tools in-depth and explains the best ways to deploy them. It also discusses using XML-based tools, the roles of software components, object technology, and metaprogramming in improving systems maintenance, as well as how to align software with business goals through strategic maintenance. |
|
