Model-based verification of quantitative non-functional properties for software product lines

Evaluating quality attributes of a design model in the early stages of development can significantly reduce the cost and risks of developing a low quality product. To make this possible, software designers should be able to predict quality attributes by reasoning on a model of the system under development. Although there exists a variety of quality-driven analysis techniques for software systems, only a few work address software product lines. This paper describes how probabilistic model checking techniques and tools can be used to verify non-functional properties of different configurations of a software product line. We propose a model-based approach that enables software engineers to assess their design solutions for software product lines in the early stages of development. Furthermore, we discuss how the analysis time can be surprisingly reduced by applying parametric model checking instead of classic model checking. The results show that the parametric approach is able to substantially alleviate the verification time and effort required to analyze non-functional properties of software product lines. (C) 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.