JRET: A tool for the reconstruction of sequence diagrams from program executions

As opposed to static analysis, in which source code is inspected in order to increase program understanding, dynamic analysis concerns the actual execution of a program and the collection of runtime data. Several strategies to retrieve dynamic information exist, including source code instrumentation and the use of a customized debugger. Since the execution of a program is traced, one will be provided with detailed information on important aspects such as polymorphism and late binding. This detailed information, however, comes at a price. A major drawback of dynamic analysis is the vast amount of data produced. Visualization tools need to deal with this problem by, for example, applying certain abstractions in order for the information to become human-readable. In this research, we developed such a visualization tool that visualizes the execution of programs through sequence diagrams: JRET. We describe the strategy used, show how it attempts to tackle the aforementioned problem, and illustrate its contribution to program comprehension through a case study.Electrical Engineering, Mathematics and Computer Scienc