Empirical analysis of network measures for predicting high severity software faults

Network measures are useful for predicting fault-prone modules. However, existing work has not distinguished faults according to their severity. In practice, high severity faults cause serious problems and require further attention. In this study, we explored the utility of network measures in high severity faultproneness prediction. We constructed software source code networks for four open-source projects by extracting the dependencies between modules. We then used univariate logistic regression to investigate the associations between each network measure and fault-proneness at a high severity level. We built multivariate prediction models to examine their explanatory ability for fault-proneness, as well as evaluated their predictive effectiveness compared to code metrics under forward-release and cross-project predictions. The results revealed the following:(1) most network measures are significantly related to high severity fault-proneness;(2) network measures generally have comparable explanatory abilities and predictive powers to those of code metrics; and(3) network measures are very unstable for cross-project predictions. These results indicate that network measures are of practical value in high severity fault-proneness prediction.