A generalized model for visualizing library popularity, adoption, and diffusion within a software ecosystem

Abstract

The popularity of super repositories such as Maven Central and the CRAN is a testament to software reuse activities in both open-source and commercial projects alike. However, several studies have highlighted the risks and dangers brought about by application developers keeping dependencies on outdated library versions. Intelligent mining of super repositories could reveal hidden trends within the corresponding software ecosystem and thereby provide valuable insights for such dependency-related decisions. In this paper, we propose the Software Universe Graph (SUG) Model as a structured abstraction of the evolution of software systems and their library dependencies over time. To demonstrate the SUG's usefulness, we conduct an empirical study using 6,374 Maven artifacts and over 6,509 CRAN packages mined from their real-world ecosystems. Visualizations of the SUG model such as ‘library coexistence pairings’ and ‘dependents diffusion’ uncover popularity, adoption and diffusion patterns within each software ecosystem. Results show the Maven ecosystem as having a more conservative approach to dependency updating than the CRAN ecosystem.