Using a hierarchical thesaurus for classifying and searching software libraries

Software reuse is an effective way to improve software productivity and quality. Software libraries are getting bigger, while most of them, such as those of object-oriented languages, use a simple but somewhat ineffective classification method. These libraries usually provide search aids for novices but experts. They are not flexible enough to serve users at different levels of familiarity with libraries. In this paper, we propose a Software Reuse Framework (SRF) for overcoming the above drawbacks. Based on a built-in hierarchical thesaurus, its classification process may be made semi-automatic. SRF is a domain-independent framework that can be adapted to various libraries and also provides four search levels to serve users with different levels of familiarity with libraries.