A static analysis of android source code for lifecycle development usage patterns
Building robust Android apps is a non-trivial task that requires skilled developers to understand various Android platform peculiarities. However, among the Android developers community, a large fractions are considered to be novice and inexperienced developers. One of the main peculiarities in...
| Main Authors: | , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English English |
| Published: |
Science Publications
2019
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://irep.iium.edu.my/73280/ http://irep.iium.edu.my/73280/ http://irep.iium.edu.my/73280/ http://irep.iium.edu.my/73280/1/73280_A%20Static%20Analysis%20of%20Android%20Source_article.107 http://irep.iium.edu.my/73280/2/73280_A%20Static%20Analysis%20of%20Android%20Source_scopus.pdf |
| Summary: | Building robust Android apps is a non-trivial task that requires
skilled developers to understand various Android platform peculiarities.
However, among the Android developers community, a large fractions are
considered to be novice and inexperienced developers. One of the main
peculiarities in the Android app development is the activity lifecycle
model. A developer needs to have deep understanding of the different
lifecycle states and callback methods that an Android activity can go
through during its runtime. These callback methods are called by the
system whenever an app activity changes its state. The developer needs to
override appropriate callback methods correctly to avoid app memory
leaks and data loss or other phone resource compromise. Detailed static
analysis of software applications provides actionable insights and helps us
to understand how applications are actually built. Although there have
been many studies focusing on static analysis of Android apps in the areas
of testing, quality, design, privacy and security; no studies to date focus
on lifecycle development practices and usage patterns thus far. In this
paper, we analyzed 842 open-source Android apps containing 5577
activities to explore and understand how Android developers actually
comply with best practices regarding the Android activity lifecycle
model. We developed a tool named SAALC that is capable of analyzing
Android activities and extracting valuable information about lifecycle
callback methods usage. Our results show, which callback methods are
implemented and the nature of the code they contain. The results also
show incorrect implementation of the callback methods and incorrect
acquiring and releasing of system resources in many Android apps and we
argue that a relatively large fraction of Android developers do not
sufficiently well understand the app lifecycle model. We also discuss our
results in comparison to the Android app lifecycle model best practices. |
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