Challenges Classification in Search-Based Refactoring

Abstract

A common task in software maintenance is refactoring. The essential refactoring goal is improving software quality. The refactoring has extended for a wide range of software artifacts in different domains, such as web, database, and desktop applications. The difficulty of the manual artifacts inspecting is an impetus for automatic refactoring. Search-based software engineering (SBSE) has been used to solve many software engineering problems as optimization problems. Automating problem-solving is the goal of applying it to reduce human efforts. Many researchers have used the search-based approach in the field of refactoring that has known as search-based refactoring (SBR). There are many challenges in SBR. Identifying refactoring challenges help to understand refactoring problem and allow researchers to present new ideas for eliminating or reducing challenges. In this paper, we studied the researches in SBR and extracted researches challenges. We intend to categorize the challenges in this area from a new and more comprehensive perspective.