Applying Continuous Code Reviews in Airport Operations Software

Code reviews are an integral part of the development of a dependable system such as for airport operations. It is commonly accepted that code reviews are an effective quality assurance technique even if a rigorous application is also a high cost factor. For large software systems a formal method may be inapplicable throughout the whole code base. In this study an airport operational database (AODB) is developed with the application of a more lightweight approach to code reviews. A continuous, distributed and change-based process is applied by the development team and evaluated in comparison to team walkthroughs (IEEE-1028) as a baseline method. The application showed to be highly useful, equally effective as the baseline, but more efficient especially for the preparation, execution and rework effort. The results show that continuous code reviews also support the understanding of the code base and the concept of collective ownership. Such processes may not completely substitute a more formal and effortful technique. Especially for reviewing critical design aspects or complex items a traditional approach is still more appropriate. The main outcome is that such lightweight code reviews may be used together with more formal approaches to ensure a high coverage and that the degree of formalism should be adopted to the criticality of the item under review.