Dynamic round-trip GUI maintenance

Abstract

One difficulty in software maintenance is that the relationship between observed program behavior and source code is not always clear. This is true for the maintenance of graphical user interfaces (GUIs), because user interface code can be scattered across the decomposition of applications. A popular approach to develop and maintain GUIs is to use "What you see is what you get" editors. They allow developers to work directly with a graphical design view instead of scattered source elements. Unfortunately GUI editors are limited by their ability to statically reconstruct dynamic collaborations between objects. In our research we investigate the combination of a hybrid dynamic and static approach to allow for round-trip maintenance of GUIs. Dynamic analysis reconstructs object relationships, providing a concrete context in which maintenance can be performed. Static checking guides the reconciliation between the GUI editors' design view and source. We implemented a prototype IDE plugin and evaluate our approach by applying it to five open source projects.