LibComp: an IntelliJ plugin for comparing Java libraries

Abstract

Software developers heavily rely on third-party libraries to accomplish their programming tasks. Since many libraries offer similar functionality, it can be difficult and tedious for developers differentiate similar libraries in order to select the most suitable one. In our previous work, we proposed the idea of metric-based library comparisons that allow developers to compare various aspects of libraries within the same domain, empowering them with information to aid with their decision. In this paper we present an IntelliJ plugin, LibComp, that provides this library metric-based comparison technique right within the developer’s IDE. As soon as a developer adds a library dependency that LibComp has information about, LibComp will highlight this dependency to let the developer know that there are alternatives available. Once the user triggers the comparison for that library, they can view various metrics about the library and its alternatives and decide if they want to use one of the alternatives. In the process, LibComp also records the number of times the developer invokes the tool and any completed replacements. Such feedback, if optionally sent to us by the developer, provides us valuable insights into developers’replacement decisions as well as information on how we can improve the tool. A video demonstrating the usage of LibComp can be found at https://youtu.be/YtEEdJan77A

BibTeX

@inproceedings{Hajj-Nadi:FSE20,
  author    = {Rehab El Hajj and
               Sarah Nadi},
  title     = {{LibComp:} an {IntelliJ} plugin for comparing Java libraries},
  booktitle = {{ESEC/SIGSOFT} {FSE}},
  pages     = {1591--1595},
  publisher = {{ACM}},
  year      = {2020},
}

LibComp: an IntelliJ plugin for comparing Java libraries

Abstract

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