Pragmatic strategies for variability management in software product lines

Abstract

After general introduction to Software Product Lines (SPL), we focus on variability management, a key technical challenge for effective reuse. We discuss reasons why commonly used variation techniques (pre-processing, configuration files) do not scale well. We present merits (visibility of feature impact on core assets, automation of product derivation, support for evolution and scalability), and trade-offs (need for skilful design and training) in applying uniform variation technique, design specifically to manage variability in SPLs. © 2011 Springer-Verlag.