Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!unmvax!deimos.cis.ksu.edu!uxc!uxc.cso.uiuc.edu!m.cs.uiuc.edu!render
From: render@m.cs.uiuc.edu
Newsgroups: comp.software-eng
Subject: Re: Surface area for software
Message-ID: <39400020@m.cs.uiuc.edu>
Date: 5 May 89 04:37:00 GMT
References: <8026@thorin.cs.unc.edu>
Lines: 20
Nf-ID: #R:thorin.cs.unc.edu:8026:m.cs.uiuc.edu:39400020:000:1011
Nf-From: m.cs.uiuc.edu!render    May  4 23:37:00 1989


Written  5:06 pm  May  3, 1989 by shan@unc.cs.unc.edu:
>Sorry about the confusion raised by my previous posting.  English is not my
>native language.  I didn't realize that "surface area" has a more common
>meaning.  Let me try to get it straight this time.
>Cox in his book, "Object Oriented Programming" p. 16, defines the "surface
>area" as "the number of things that must be understood and properly dealt
>with for one programmer's code to function correctly in combination with
>another's."

I'm sorry I misunderstood you.  I don't think Cox chose the term well (if 
indeed he did choose the term) given what he intends for it to mean.  I 
would've said "object context" or "object interface".  His definition is
so vague (possibly intentionally) that any concrete means of calculating
"surface area" is difficult to specify.  You might take a look at papers
discussing the quantification of module interfaces for more help.  I can
give you a couple of pointers if you want.

Hal Render
render@cs.uiuc.edu