%0 Conference Paper %1 Caprile1999 %A Caprile, Bruno %A Tonella, Paolo %D 1999 %J Proceedings of the Sixth Working Conference on Reverse Engineering %K ConceptLattices identifiers language vocabulary %P 112-122 %R 10.1109/WCRE.1999.806952 %T Nomen est omen: analyzing the language of function identifiers %X The identifiers chosen by programmers as function names contain valuable information. They are often the starting point for program understanding activities, especially when high-level views, like the call graph, are available. In this paper, the lexical, syntactic and semantic structure of function identifiers is analyzed by means of a segmentation technique, a regular language and a conceptual classification. The application of these analyses to a database of procedural programs suggests some potential uses of the results, ranging from support for program understanding to the evolution towards standard and more maintainable forms of programs

@inproceedings{Caprile1999, abstract = {The identifiers chosen by programmers as function names contain valuable information. They are often the starting point for program understanding activities, especially when high-level views, like the call graph, are available. In this paper, the lexical, syntactic and semantic structure of function identifiers is analyzed by means of a segmentation technique, a regular language and a conceptual classification. The application of these analyses to a database of procedural programs suggests some potential uses of the results, ranging from support for program understanding to the evolution towards standard and more maintainable forms of programs}, added-at = {2009-05-03T15:29:37.000+0200}, author = {Caprile, Bruno and Tonella, Paolo}, biburl = {https://www.bibsonomy.org/bibtex/262010d4dfb2f493d51819acfe1ea68b6/ericbouwers}, description = {Introducing a grammar for the language of identifiers. Results of several different experiments are reported: segmentation, frequencies of letters, identifier separation, lexical types, parsing and concept analysis. Several different application area's are mentioned: 1) forward engineering, help in choosing identifiers 2) reverse engineering, restructure identifiers of a program 3) re-documenting an existing source 4) traceability improvement 5) migration support (towards oo) 6) dictionary based reverse engineering tools}, doi = {10.1109/WCRE.1999.806952}, interhash = {b93c1b01138cfea0f13ecde84b05791f}, intrahash = {62010d4dfb2f493d51819acfe1ea68b6}, journal = {Proceedings of the Sixth Working Conference on Reverse Engineering}, keywords = {ConceptLattices identifiers language vocabulary}, month = Oct, pages = {112-122}, timestamp = {2009-05-03T15:29:37.000+0200}, title = {Nomen est omen: analyzing the language of function identifiers}, year = 1999 }