Generating Precise Dependencies for Large Software

Intra- and inter-module dependencies can be a significant source of technical debt in the long-term software development, especially for large software with millions of lines of code. This paper designs and implements a precise and scalable tool that extracts code dependencies and their utilization for large C/C++ software projects. The tool extracts both symbol-level and module-level dependencies of a software system and identifies potential underutilized and inconsistent dependencies. Such information points to potential refactoring opportunities and help developers perform large-scale refactoring tasks.

• Software Engineering