An Empirical Study of the Interplay between Architecture and Software Quality using Evolutionary History of Software

Abstract

Conventional wisdom suggests that a software system's architecture has a significant impact on its evolution. Well-designed software architecture employs the principle of separation of concern to allocate different functionalities and responsibilities to different architectural elements comprising the system and it is easier to make changes to a software system that has a well-designed architecture. Conversely, bad architecture, manifested as architectural bad smells, can increase the complexity, possibly leading to poor software quality.