Language-agnostic dynamic analysis of multilingual code: promises, pitfalls, and prospects

Abstract

Analyzing multilingual code holistically is key to systematic quality assurance of real-world software which is mostly developed in multiple computer languages. Toward such analyses, state-of-the-art approaches propose an almost-fully language-agnostic methodology and apply it to dynamic dependence analysis/slicing of multilingual code, showing great promises. We investigated this methodology through a technical analysis followed by a replication study applying it to 10 real-world multilingual projects of diverse language combinations. Our results revealed critical practicality (i.e., having the levels of efficiency/scalability, precision, and extensibility to various language combinations for practical use) challenges to the methodology. Based on the results, we reflect on the underlying pitfalls of the language-agnostic design that leads to such challenges. Finally, looking forward to the prospects of dynamic analysis for multilingual code, we identify a new research direction towards better practicality and precision while not sacrificing extensibility much, as supported by preliminary results. The key takeaway is that pursuing fully language-agnostic analysis may be both impractical and unnecessary, and striving for a better balance between language independence and practicality may be more fruitful.