Comparison of the effect of development paradigms on increases in complexity

As maintenance costs continue to increase at an alarming pace, improved techniques for controlling the maintenance process become imperative. One approach to improving the maintainability of software is to control the complexity of the module at the design phase. Since complexity is a measure of the effort to comprehend and maintain software, maintenance effort increases as complexity increases. This study provides an analysis of the changes in complexity during the development of two systems based on different development paradigms. Inter-system and intra-system comparisons of complexity increases are performed. Six complexity metrics representing structure, length and composite characteristics are evaluated. Results of the study include variances in complexity increases between systems based on different development paradigms