Visualizing Relationships among Components Using Grouping Information

A computer-readable medium for storing computer-readable instructions, the computer-readable instructions providing a graph processing module when executed by one or more processing devices, the computer-readable instructions comprising:

• logic configured to perform similarity analysis to assess similarity among components, said logic for performing similarity analysis using grouping information to exert group-level influence on the similarity analysis;
• logic configured to perform importance analysis to assess relative importance of the components, said logic for performing importance analysis using the grouping information to exert group-level influence on the importance analysis;
• and
• logic configured to present a visualization of results provided by the similarity analysis and results provided by the importance analysis, at least one dimension of the visualization being associated with the results provided by the similarity analysis, and at least one other dimension of the visualization being associated with the results provided by the importance analysis.

A graph processing module for visualizing relationships among components of a software system, comprising:

• a similarity analysis module configured to assess similarity among the components, said similarity analysis module comprising:
• logic configured to coalesce nodes in a component-level graph G based on grouping information, to form a group-level graph Gg;
• logic configured to determine distances dij between nodes in the component-level graph G;
• logic configured to determine distances dgij between nodes in the group-level graph Gg;
• logic configured to determine adjusted distances σij based on the distances dij obtained from the component-level graph G and the distances dgij obtained from the group-level graph Gg;
• and
• logic configured to perform similarity analysis using the adjusted distances σij;
• an importance analysis module configured to assess relative importance of the components, said importance analysis module comprising:
• logic configured to generate importance values associated with nodes within the group-level graph Gg;
• and
• logic configured to perform importance analysis for components within the component-level graph G, as biased by the importance values generated for the nodes within the group-level graph Gg;
• and
• a graph layout module configured to provide a visualization of results provided by the similarity analysis module and the importance analysis module.