DEPARTMENT OF AI&DS

COURSE NAME –SOFTWARE RELIABILITY

COURSE CODE – 21CS3258R
Topic:
MCCABE’S CYCLOMATICCOMPLEXITY METRIC

SESSION - 4
 AIM OF THE SESSION

To familiarize students with the basic concept of McCabe’s CyclomaticComplexity metric

INSTRUCTIONAL OBJECTIVES

This Session is designed to:

1. Define Cyclomatic Complexity
2. Define Graph Complexity
3. Describe basis path testing

LEARNING OUTCOMES

At the end of this session, you should be able to:

1. Define Cyclomatic Complexity
2. Define Graph Complexity
3. Describe basis path testing

2
 MCCABE’S CYCLOMATIC COMPLEXITY METRIC

• A software metric used to measure the complexity of

software
• Developed by Thomas McCabe
• Described (informally) as the number of decision
points + 1
Cyclomatic Complexity V(G)

Computing the cyclomatic

complexity:

number of simple decisions + 1

or

number of enclosed areas + 1

In this case, V(G) = 4

 Graph Complexity
(Cyclomatic Complexity)
A number of industry studies have indicated
that the higher V(G), the higher the probability
or errors.

modules

V(G)

modules in this range are

more error prone
 Basis Path Testing
Next, we derive the
independent paths:
1

Since V(G) = 4,
2 there are four paths

3 Path 1: 1,2,3,6,7,8
4
5 6 Path 2: 1,2,3,5,7,8
Path 3: 1,2,4,7,8
Path 4: 1,2,4,7,2,4,...7,8
7
Finally, we derive test
cases to exercise these
8
paths.
WHAT IS THE COMPLEXITY?
public void howComplex() {
int i=20;

while (i<10) {
System.out.printf("i is %d", i);
if (i%2 == 0) {
System.out.println("even");
} else {
System.out.println("odd");
}
}
}
 WHAT IS THE COMPLEXITY V(G)?
public void howComplex() {
int i=20;

while (i<10) {
System.out.printf("i is %d", i);
if (i%2 == 0) {
System.out.println("even");
} else {
System.out.println("odd");
}
}
}

V(G) = 2 enclosed area + 1 = 3

OUTPUT FROM JAVANCSS
 SELF-ASSESSMENT QUESTIONS

1. Define Cyclomatic Complexity

2. Define Graph Complexity
3. Describe basis path testing
 REFERENCES FOR FURTHER LEARNING OF THE
SESSION

Reference Books:
TEXT BOOKS:

Gopala swamy ramesh, srinivasan desikan,“software reliability engineering” – , McGrawHill

Education Edition,(2000)
Mukesh Singhal and Nagesh N. Karanth,”Software Reliability Engineering” – A Practitioner's
Approach McGraw-Hill Education ,2003,.

Reference Book
Software Reliability Measurement, Prediction, Application, John D. Musa, Anthony Iannino,
Kazuhira Okumoto,(1987 )

WEB REFERNCES/MOOCS:
https://www.javatpoint.com/software-engineering-software-reliability
https://thechief.io/c/blameless/heres-your-complete-definition-software-reliability/
https://www.codingninjas.com/codestudio/library/software-reliability-measurement-techniques
 THANK YOU

Team –Software Reliability