2nd Workshop on Empirical Studies in Reverse Engineering

Marco TorchianoPolitecnico di Torino

marco.torchiano@polito.it

Abstract

Recently several tools and techniques for thereverse engineering of existing code have beenproposed and implemented but very rarely any attemptwas made to empirically validate usability andusefulness in the field are uncommon. This workshopaddresses this gap and offers an open discussionforum to present techniques and results relating to thistopic.

1. Introduction

During the last ten years tools and techniques forthe reverse engineering of existing code have beenproposed and implemented. However, systematicattempts to empirically validate usability andusefulness in the field are uncommon. In order toaccompany this discipline toward its maturity, lessonslearned concerning these validations need to be sharedamong the reverse engineering community.Theresulting increased awareness of cost-effectivevalidation methods supports the introduction ofproposed tools and techniques in thesoftwaredevelopment and evolution process

2. Goal

The first objective of the workshop will be arecognition of the current ongoing and concludedempirical studies in the area of reverse engineering.These will form the map of the known world in thisarea.

Second, we aim at surveying the techniques andmethods used to conduct the studies; they are thecandidates to populate the researcher's toolbox.

Third, we wish to map the studies to a taxonomy ofreverse engineering techniques and tools, in order tounderstand what the coverage of the studies is.

Fourth, networking of researchers to design andconduct studies replicated at different locations.

3. History

WESRE builds on the success of the 1st edition,that was held in Budapest, within STEP 2005, co-located with the IEEE International Conference onSofwtare Maintenance (ICSM 2005). WESRE 2005had good attendance and participants reported verypositive feedback about the outcome. The same

format of WESRE 2005 will be kept in the 2006edition: short paper presentations followed bydiscussion.

4. Topics

The topics of interest include but are not limited tothe following: tools and techniques fo empiricalstudies, lessons learned in running empirical studies,experimental designs for RE, usability assessments,cost-effectiveness of various approaches, indicationsfor tool improvement, frameworks and infrastructures.

5. Results

The main results the participants of the workshopcan achieve are:

• Establishment of a research network in empiricalstudies in reverse engineering.

• Promotion of best practices both in conducting andpublishing empirical studies.

• Identification of critical success / failure factors inempirical studies.

• Organization and planning of experimentreplication

6. Organizers

Chair: Marco Torchiano.Program committee: Filippo Ricca, Giuseppe Di

Lucca, Bart Du Bois, Tarja Systa, Paolo Tonella.

Proceedings of the 13th Working Conference on Reverse Engineering (WCRE'06)0-7695-2719-1/06 $20.00 © 2006