Uniquifying architecture visualization through variable 3D model generation

Hoff, Adrian; Seidl, Christoph; Lanza, Michele

doi:10.1145/3571788.3571798

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Conference paper (in proceedings)

Uniquifying architecture visualization through variable 3D model generation

Hoff, Adrian ORCID IT University of Copenhagen, Denmark
Seidl, Christoph IT University of Copenhagen, Denmark
Lanza, Michele ORCID Istituto del software (SI), Facoltà di scienze informatiche, Università della Svizzera italiana, Svizzera

2023

Published in:

International Working Conference on Variability Modelling of Software-Intensive Systems (VaMoS). - 2023, p. 77–81

English Software visualization facilitates the interactive exploration of large-scale code bases, e.g., to rediscover the architecture of a legacy system. Visualizations of software structure suffer from repetitive patterns that complicate distinguishing different subsystems and recognizing previously visited parts of an architecture.
We leverage variability-modeling techniques to "uniquify" visualizations of subsystems via custom-tailored 3D models of recognizable landmarks: For each subsystem, we derive a descriptor and translate it to a (random but deterministic) configuration of a feature model of variable 3D geometry to support large numbers of different 3D models while capturing the design language of a particular type of landmark. We devised a hybrid variant derivation mechanism using a slots-and-hooks composition system for 3D geometry as well as adjusting visual characteristics, e.g., material. We demonstrate our method by creating various different trophies as landmarks for the visualization of a software system.

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