Early estimation of software size in object-oriented environments: a case study in a CMM level 3 software firm

Early estimation of the size of a software product is extremely important. In this paper we analyze two software packages developed by a CMM level 3 software firm. We study if any property of analysis objects can be used to infer the size of the final code in an object-oriented environment. In both cases we find the number of methods well correlated with software size, in the sense that the correlation with the final size is high (r > 0.77) and significant at the level .05. Inferential statistics guarantee that the results of this study are also applicable outside the scope of the two projects.