Visualization of Software Architectures in Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality

Abstract

Software architecture is abstract and intangible. Tools for visualizing software architecture can help to comprehend the implemented architecture but they need an effective and feasible visual metaphor, which maps all relevant aspects of a software architecture and fits all types of software. We present the visualization of component-based software architectures in Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR). We describe how to get all relevant data for the visualization by data mining on the whole source tree and on source code level of OSGi-based projects. The data is stored in a graph database for further analysis and visualization. The software visualization uses an island metaphor, which represents every module as a distinct island. The whole island is displayed in the confines of a virtual table, where users can explore the software visualization on multiple levels of granularity by performing navigational tasks. Our approach allows users to get a first overview about the complexity of an OSGi-based software system by interactively exploring its modules as well as the dependencies between them.