A NEW METRIC FOR OBJECT-ORIENTED DESIGN

The paper presents a new metric for the object-oriented design. The metric measures the complexity of a class in an object-oriented design. The metrics include operation complexity, operation argument complexity, attribute complexity, operation coupling, class coupling, cohesion, class hierarchy, and reuse. An experiment is conducted to build the metric system. The approach is to derive a regression model of the metrics based on the experimental data. Moreover, the subjective judgement by the expert is incorporated in the regression model. This ensures that the metric system is pragmatic and flexible for the software industry.