EVolve: an open extensible software visualization framework

ABSTRACT

Existing visualization tools typically do not allow easy extension by new visualization techniques, and are often coupled with inflexible data input mechanisms. This paper presents EVolve, a flexible and extensible framework for visualizing program characteristics and behaviour. The framework is flexible in the sense that it can visualize many kinds of data, and it is extensible in the sense that it is quite straightforward to add new kinds of visualizations.The overall architecture of the framework consists of the core EVolve platform that communicates with data sources via a well defined data protocol and which communicates with visualization methods via a visualization protocol.Given a data source, an end-user can use EVolve as a stand-alone tool by interactively creating, configuring and modifying visualizations. A variety of visualizations are provided in the current EVolve library, with features that facilitate the comparison of multiple views on the same execution data. We demonstrate EVolve in the context of visualizing execution behaviour of Java programs.

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INDEX TERMS

Primary Classification:
  D. Software
  D.2 SOFTWARE ENGINEERING
      D.2.5 Testing and Debugging
          Subjects: Tracing

Keywords:
JVMPI, Java, object-oriented systems, software visualization, trace-based visualization