Abstract

Promoting software reuse practice requires more effective support. In this paper we discuss some problems in current software reuse systems and how current research in retrieval through natural language specifications addresses them. We introduce work in progress for a software reuse system that aims to provide high precision in retrieval by processing both queries in natural language and descriptions of components in a software library. Additional support for application developers (for understanding and adapting software components) and for library managers (for creation, organization and reorganization of reusable components) is also discussed. 1 Introduction A survey of application programmers [1], conducted to discover user needs and attitudes toward reuse, shows that users consider reuse worthwhile, but most of them (especially those without object-oriented experience) expect more from application generators or from tools for automatic programming than from reuse systems like br...

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