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Does the Performance of TDD Hold Across Software Companies and Premises? A Group of Industrial Experiments on TDD

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Product-Focused Software Process Improvement (PROFES 2018)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNPSE,volume 11271))

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Abstract

Test-Driven Development (TDD) has been claimed to increase external software quality. However, the extent to which TDD increases external quality has been seldom studied in industrial experiments. We conduct four industrial experiments in two different companies to evaluate the performance of TDD on external quality. We study whether the performance of TDD holds across the premises of the same company and across companies. We identify participant-level characteristics impacting results. Iterative-Test Last (ITL), the reverse approach of TDD, outperforms TDD in three out of four premises. ITL outperforms TDD in both companies. The larger the experience with unit testing and testing tools, the larger the difference in performance between ITL and TDD (in favour of ITL). Technological environment (i.e., programming language and testing tool) seems not to impact results. Evaluating participant-level characteristics impacting results in industrial experiments may ease the understanding of TDD’s performance in realistic settings.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    For simplicity’s sake, along the rest of the article we refer to external quality and quality interchangeably.

  2. 2.

    The survey and its results were published elsewhere [36].

  3. 3.

    For simplicity’s sake, we consider the variables measured along the survey as continuous. This approach is commonly followed in other disciplines [37].

  4. 4.

    The normality assumption is met in all experiments according to the Shapiro-Wilk test [38].

  5. 5.

    The regression lines for “Programming” and “Language” partially overlap and thus, only that of “Language” is visible.

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Acknowledgments

This research was developed with the support of the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation project TIN2014-60490-P.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. M3S (M-Group), ITEE University of Oulu, Oulu, Finland

    Adrian Santos & Markku Oivo

  2. F-Secure, Oulu, Finland

    Janne Järvinen

  3. Bittium, Oulu, Finland

    Jari Partanen

  4. Escuela Técnica Superior de Ingenieros Informáticos, Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, Madrid, Spain

    Natalia Juristo

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  1. Adrian Santos
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Adrian Santos .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Technische Universität Clausthal, Goslar, Germany

    Marco Kuhrmann

  2. Leibniz University Hannover, Hannover, Germany

    Kurt Schneider

  3. University of Tartu, Tartu, Estonia

    Dietmar Pfahl

  4. Okayama Prefectural University, Okayama, Japan

    Sousuke Amasaki

  5. QAware GmbH, Munich, Germany

    Marcus Ciolkowski

  6. Chalmers | University of Gothenburg, Gothenburg, Sweden

    Regina Hebig

  7. IT University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark

    Paolo Tell

  8. Leibniz University Hannover, Hannover, Germany

    Jil Klünder

  9. Clausthal University of Technology, Goslar, Germany

    Steffen Küpper

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Santos, A., Järvinen, J., Partanen, J., Oivo, M., Juristo, N. (2018). Does the Performance of TDD Hold Across Software Companies and Premises? A Group of Industrial Experiments on TDD. In: Kuhrmann, M., et al. Product-Focused Software Process Improvement. PROFES 2018. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 11271. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-03673-7_17

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-03673-7_17

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