An empirical study of data constraint implementations in Java

Software systems are designed according to guidelines and constraints defined by business rules. Some of these define the allowable or required values for data handled systems. These usually originate from problem domain (e.g., regulations), developers must write code that enforces them. Understanding how implemented is essential testing, debugging, software change. Unfortunately, there no widely-accepted best practices on implement constraints. This paper presents an empirical study investigates in Java. We implementation 187 extracted documentation eight real-world Java First, we perform a qualitative analysis textual description identify four constraint types. Second, manually implementations reveal they can be grouped into 31 patterns. The patterns indicates prefer handful when implementing also found evidence suggesting deviations associated with unusual decisions smells. Third, develop tool-assisted protocol allows us 256 additional trace links using 13 most common find almost half have multiple enforcing statements, which clones different Finally, 16 professional describe easily accurately recognized code.