Green Configurations of Functional Quality Attributes

Abstract

Functional quality attributes (FQAs) are those quality attributes that, to be satisfied, require the incorporation of additional functionality into the application architecture. By adding an FQA (e.g., security) we can improve the quality of the final product, but there is also an increase in energy consumption. This paper proposes a solution to help the software architect to generate configurations of FQAs whilst keeping the energy consumed by the application as low as possible. For this, a usage model is defined for each FQA, taking into account the variables that affect the energy consumption, and that the values of these variables change according to the part of the application where the FQA is required. We extend a Software Product Line that models a family of FQAs to incorporate the variability of the usage model and the existing frameworks that implement FQAs. We generate the most eco-efficient configuration of FQAs by selecting the framework with the most suitable characteristics according to the requirements of the application.