Lehman's laws of software evolution

In software engineering, the laws of software evolution refer to a series of laws that Lehman and Belady formulated starting in 1974 with respect to software evolution.^[1]^[2] The laws describe a balance between forces driving new developments on one hand, and forces that slow down progress on the other hand. Over the past decades the laws have been revised and extended several times.^[3]^[4]^[5]

^ Lehman, Meir M. (1980). "Programs, Life Cycles, and Laws of Software Evolution". Proc. IEEE. 68 (9): 1060–1076. doi:10.1109/proc.1980.11805.
^ Lehman, M. M.; J. F. Ramil; P. D. Wernick; D. E. Perry; W. M. Turski (1997). "Metrics and laws of software evolution—the nineties view" (PDF). Proc. 4th International Software Metrics Symposium (METRICS '97). pp. 20–32. doi:10.1109/METRIC.1997.637156.
^ Lehman, M. M. (1980). "On Understanding Laws, Evolution, and Conservation in the Large-Program Life Cycle". Journal of Systems and Software. 1: 213–221. doi:10.1016/0164-1212(79)90022-0.
^ Herraiz, Israel; Rodriguez, Daniel; Robles, Gregorio; Gonzalez-Barahona, Jesus M. (2013). "The evolution of the laws of software evolution". ACM Computing Surveys. 46 (2): 1–28. doi:10.1145/2543581.2543595. ISSN 0360-0300.
^ Liguo Yu and Alok Mishra (2013) An Empirical Study of Lehman’s Law on Software Quality Evolution in International Journal of Software and Informatics, 11/2013; 7(3):469-481.

[laws1-1] Lehman, Meir M. (1980). "Programs, Life Cycles, and Laws of Software Evolution". Proc. IEEE. 68 (9): 1060–1076. doi:10.1109/proc.1980.11805.

[softwarelaws-2] Lehman, M. M.; J. F. Ramil; P. D. Wernick; D. E. Perry; W. M. Turski (1997). "Metrics and laws of software evolution—the nineties view" (PDF). Proc. 4th International Software Metrics Symposium (METRICS '97). pp. 20–32. doi:10.1109/METRIC.1997.637156.

[laws1-5-3] Lehman, M. M. (1980). "On Understanding Laws, Evolution, and Conservation in the Large-Program Life Cycle". Journal of Systems and Software. 1: 213–221. doi:10.1016/0164-1212(79)90022-0.

[HerraizRodriguez2013-4] Herraiz, Israel; Rodriguez, Daniel; Robles, Gregorio; Gonzalez-Barahona, Jesus M. (2013). "The evolution of the laws of software evolution". ACM Computing Surveys. 46 (2): 1–28. doi:10.1145/2543581.2543595. ISSN 0360-0300.

[5] Liguo Yu and Alok Mishra (2013) An Empirical Study of Lehman’s Law on Software Quality Evolution in International Journal of Software and Informatics, 11/2013; 7(3):469-481.

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