Martin Fowler – the design pseudo-graph

How much effort should you put into contolling the structure of your code-base? A nice article by Martin Fowler. "The problem with no-design, is that by not putting effort into the design, the code base deteriorates and becomes harder to … Read MoreRead More

Eclipse Plugin (OSGi) Visualization

If you are going mad trying to figure out the dependencies between lots of Eclipse plug-ins, or work with other large OSGi systems, you may be interested in this. We’ve had a few people looking for an Eclipse/OSGi backend for … Read More

Jar Hell

A lot of jars can contribute to (and mask) the logical package/class structure. Here’s how to make sense of the whole mess using Structure101.1. View your project in the Logical hierarchy2. Tag the classes or packages you’re interested in3.  Switch … Read More

DevX review of Structure101

"Getting your arms (and eyes) around large, complex code bases has never been easy, but Structure101 from Headway Software may just be the elegant solution to this age-old problem. Find out how this visual design tool analyzes your enterprise projects … Read MoreRead More

Complexity Debt – don’t “fix it”, “keep a lid on it”

So you just discovered that your code-base has racked up a whole load of complexity debt. This  maybe explains why progress seems so painfully slow lately. You briefly think of suggesting a major complexity-reducing refactoring effort. This will delay the … Read More

Structure101 v2 goes GA today

Additions let you see complete slices of a code-base at any level, home in on structural complexity, view dependency graphs in matrix form, and map code items and groups (like tangles) through different hierarchies, slices and perspectives (learn more or … Read More

Structure101 v2 beta 2 released

Structure101 is for contolling architecture and structural complexity. Version 2 introduced slicing and tagging. Beta 2 adds dependency hiding and cross-perspective navigation. New in v2 beta 2: Context menus (right mouse click) have been added. This introduces the new capability … Read More

Spring 2’s architecture – A single dependency cycle slipped in

The Spring guys have let a single dependency cycle into their architecture. A very small flaw, but it’s a perfect example of why you need to check your code-base at different levels to keep it truly tangle-free. I did a … Read More

Tracking complexity debt

Un-monitored, the complexity of a code-base increases with its size. Jboss and Struts are perfect examples. However monitoring complexity helps you keep complexity debt under control, or even down to zero. If you publish the last couple of years worth … Read More

Manage complexity like debt

Ben Hosking writes in Managing Complexity – The aim of Designing Code that: “The most important part of design is managing complexity“ I like the simplicity of that. What happens if you don’t manage complexity. Well, it starts to cost. … Read More