Systematic mapping study: On the coverage of aspect-oriented methodologies for the early phases of the software development life cycle

Although the number of aspect-oriented software development techniques and tools proposed by the scientific literature have been increasing since the late 80′s, the evidence about the benefits that the aspect-oriented paradigm have reached in real-world settings is scarce. Our objective is to identify and classify the aspect-oriented software development methodologies used to reduce the effort and costs of moving from traditional approaches to the aspect-oriented approach in real-world settings. We conducted a systematic mapping study (SMS). Our search strategies retrieved a set of 3212 papers out of which 115 were selected as relevant studies. We defined eight categories to classify these studies: aspect-oriented methodologies proposed for early aspects; development early phases covered; notations; modeling techniques; supporting tools; aspect-oriented methodologies used in real-world settings; benefits reported and unsolved issues. As a result, 39 named methodologies were reported; they cover the business modeling (14 papers), requirements (93 papers), test cases (1 paper) and design (41 papers) phases of the software development life cycle (SDLC); we found 36 different notations, with UML as the most mentioned (66 papers); 22 modeling techniques were found, where the use cases were the ones that appeared the most, on 43 occasions; 43 support tools of which none was repeated in more than 3 articles; 15 applications in real-world settings; 17 benefits, modularization being the most mentioned with 4 occurrences; and 15 pending improvement opportunities. Finally, we have obtained conclusions: the literature analyzed demonstrates that there are no prevailing standards on methodologies and notations, beyond that the most employed are those belonging to the OMG; we have not found any methodology that includes all phases of the SDLC; the diagrams corresponding to OMG’s standards account for 78% of the results in the facet of modeling techniques; there are no tools that have the greatest predilection and the most used is mentioned only three times; in addition, 41% of the articles do not mention any tool; the evidence of aspect-oriented methodologies application in real-world settings reached just the 10%, although the declared benefits are coincident with those promised in the aspect-orientated literature. The mentioned pending issues can guide new studies (RQ8).