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Description / Features

This plug-in estimates the complexity of each file in order to help you use the "abacus methodology" ("méthode des abaques" in French).

This is a methodology widely used in France to estimate the effort of changes. Customers and providers agree on the abacus at the beginning of the maintenance process.

Example of Abacus

		Complexity of the Change
		Simple	Medium	Complex	Very complex
Complexity of the File	Simple	0.1	0.3	0.8	1.5
	Medium	0.3	0.6	1.8	3.0
	Complex	0.6	1.2	3.0	5.0
	Very complex	1.0	2.0	5.0	8.0

Values are in man days.

Interpretation:

According to this abacus, the effort of a complex change in a simple file would be estimated to 0.8 man days.
According to this abacus, the effort of a very complex change in a complex file would be estimated to 5.0 man days.

Features

The complexity of a file is computed according to its cyclomatic complexity.

The default values are (estimation for a Java project):

Abacus Complexity	Cyclomatic Complexity
Simple	<= 20
Medium	20 < X <= 50
Complex	50 < X <= 100
Very complex	> 100

See the Configuration section to set your own thresholds.

At file level, you can either use the Abacus tab or create a filter to display the abacus complexity measure.

Sonar > Abacus Plugin > abacus-tab.png

At module or project level, a widget is available to display the average abacus complexity and the abacus complexity distribution.

The abacus complexity distribution can be displayed either in number of files or percentage.

See screenshots below.

Sonar > Abacus Plugin > numberOfFilesDistribution.PNG

Sonar > Abacus Plugin > percentageDistribution.PNG

Why using this plug-in?

To help you estimate your effort of change more accurately and in a quicker way.
To help clients and providers argue less about the effort of change as they will have a factual way to estimate the complexity of each file.

Installation

Install the Abacus plugin through the Update Center or download it into the SONAR_HOME/extensions/plugins directory
Restart the Sonar server

Configuration

Properties

Property

Default value

Description

sonar.abacus.complexityThresholds

Simple:20;Medium:50;Complex:100;Very Complex

To set your own thresholds to compute the abacus complexity.

Usage: ThresholdName1:ThresholdComplexity1;ThresholdName2:ThresholdComplexity2;...;ThresholdNameN

Widget Parameters

Parameter

Default value

Description

defaultColors

33cc33,ffff33,ff9900,ff0033,000000

Coma-separated list of colors (hexadecimal format) for the pie chart display.

Make sure to have at least as many colors as levels of complexity in your abacus.

Default value is green, yellow, orange, red and black.

defaultDisplay

files

To set the default display: number of files distribution or percentage distribution.

Possible values:

files
percentage

Known Limitations

Drill-down from the average abacus complexity of a module/project does not work due to the following issue in Sonar Core: SONAR-3233.
Differential views are not implemented.
Compatibility with VIEWS: as each project can define its own abacus, this plug-in does not compute the abacus complexity and distribution for a view.