The DOI matches its Crossref record; 25 of the 27 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
Tracking Code Clones in Evolving Software
Abstract
Code clones are generally considered harmful in software development, and the predominant approach is to try to eliminate them through refactoring. However, recent research has provided evidence that it may not always be practical, feasible, or cost-effective to eliminate certain clone groups. We propose a technique for tracking clones in evolving software. Our technique relies on the concept of abstract clone region descriptors (CRD), which describe clone regions within methods in a robust way that is independent from the exact text of the clone region or its location in a file. We present our definition of CRDs, and describe a complete clone tracking system capable of producing CRDs from the output of a clone detection tool, notify developers of modifications to clone regions, and support the simultaneous editing of clone regions. We report on two experiments and a case study conducted to assess the performance and usefulness of our approach.
Overview
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Verification
Claims the paper makes
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
In the citing paper
“These two clone-tracking tools consider the possible set of clones, show the length and the number of instances of all code clones, not just nearby ones, to help the developer predict E(C w ) of handing any or all of these clones.”
From Foraging and navigations, fundamentally: developers' predictions of value and cost (2016) · cites this paper as [11]
Citations
Cites
Refactoring: Improving the Design of Existing Code
Fowler, M. (2002) · Lecture notes in computer science · doi:10.1007/3-540-45672-4_31 · Cited by 5,615
CCFinder: a multilinguistic token-based code clone detection system for large scale source code
Kamiya, T., Kusumoto, S., & Inoue, K. (2002) · IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering · doi:10.1109/tse.2002.1019480 · Cited by 1,715
A technique for computer detection and correction of spelling errors
Damerau, F. J. (1964) · Communications of the ACM · doi:10.1145/363958.363994 · Cited by 1,598
An empirical study of code clone genealogies
Kim, M., Sazawal, V., Notkin, D. S., & Murphy, G. C. (2005) · ACM Joint European Software Engineering Conference and Symposium on the Foundations of Software Engineering (ESEC/FSE) · doi:10.1145/1081706.1081737 · Cited by 538
Xing, Z., & Stroulia, E. (2005) · IEEE/ACM International Conference on Automated Software Engineering (ASE) · doi:10.1145/1101908.1101919 · Cited by 374
An Overview of Sequence Comparison: Time Warps, String Edits, and Macromolecules
Kruskal, J. B. (1983) · SIAM Review · doi:10.1137/1025045 · Cited by 352
An ethnographic study of copy and paste programming practices in oopl
Kim, M., Bergman, L., Lau, T., & Notkin, D. (2004) · Cited by 240
Representing concerns in source code
Robillard, M. P., & Murphy, G. C. (2007) · ACM Transactions on Software Engineering and Methodology · doi:10.1145/1189748.1189751 · Cited by 215
Self-citationAn empirical study of code clone genealogies
Kim, M., Sazawal, V., Notkin, D. S., & Murphy, G. C. (2005) · ACM SIGSOFT Software Engineering Notes · doi:10.1145/1095430.1081737 · Cited by 208
Managing Duplicated Code with Linked Editing
Toomim, M., Begel, A., & Graham, S. L. (2005) · doi:10.1109/vlhcc.2004.35 · Cited by 179
Flagged first, then by citations
2 of the 27 references couldn’t be matched to a known paper.
Research works printed but not linked: 2
- tairas, 0, Bibliography of Code Detection Literature
- 0, Eclipse Platform Technical Overview
Cited by
Sorted by citations
Items 201–221 of 221
Revealing Missing Bug-Fixes in Code Clones in Large-Scale Code Bases
Poehlmann, M., & Juergens, E. (2024) · doi:10.14279/tuj.eceasst.60.853
Code clone detection technique of android layout codes using view attribute filtering
Lee, J., Jeong, J., & In, H. P. (2016) · Contemporary Engineering Sciences · doi:10.12988/ces.2016.6443
AN EMPIRICAL STUDY FOR THE IMPACT OF MAINTENANCE ACTIVITIES IN CLONE EVOLUTION
Marks, L. D. (2009) · QSpace (Queen's University Library)
Leveraging Historical Code Changes to Support Clone Management Activities
Sourav, S. (2015) · QSpace (Queen's University Library)
LibDetector: Version Identific ation of Libraries in
Mike, Z. (2016)
Detection of redundant clone relations based on clone subsumption
Merlo, E., & Lavoie, T. (2009) · PolyPublie (École Polytechnique de Montréal)
Towards Collaborative Scientific Workflow Management System
Mostaeen, G. (2019) · HARVEST (University of Saskatchewan)
An Exploratory Study on Detection of Cloned Code in Information Systems
Batista, M. E., Júnior, P. A. P., & Costa, H. A. X. (2019) · Anais do Simpósio Brasileiro de Sistemas de Informação (SBSI) · doi:10.1145/3330204.3330277
Wang, W., & Godfrey, M. W. (2012) · IEEE International Workshop on Software Clones (IWSC) · doi:10.1109/iwsc.2012.6227878
A Quantitative and Qualitative Empirical Evaluation of a Test Refactoring Tool
Iman, A. (2021) · UWSpace (University of Waterloo)
Improving the Unification of Software Clones using Tree and Graph Matching Algorithms
Krishnan, G. P. (2014) · Spectrum Research Repository (Concordia University)
Visual Augmentation of Source Code Editors: A Systematic Mapping Study
Sulír, M., Bačíková, M., Chodarev, S., & Porubän, J. (2021) · doi:10.26226/morressier.613b545d842293c031b5b99f
Code Clone Detection and Analysis in Open Source Applications
Ali, A.-F. M., Sulaiman, S., Syed-Mohamad, S. M., & Xing, Z. (2014) · IGI Global eBooks · doi:10.4018/978-1-4666-7230-7.ch100
IDENTIFICATION OF SOFTWARE CLONE FILES USING MACHINE LEARNING
Swapna, M. V. (2023) · INTERANTIONAL JOURNAL OF SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH IN ENGINEERING AND MANAGEMENT · doi:10.55041/ijsrem27673
An Insight into Code Smell Detection Tool
Mourya, S., Singh, P. P., & Singh, V. B. (2024) · Springer series in reliability engineering · doi:10.1007/978-3-031-55048-5_17
Insight into code clone management through refactoring: a systematic literature review
Kaur, M., Rattan, D., & Lal, M. (2025) · Computer Science Review · doi:10.1016/j.cosrev.2025.100767
Studying the Effects of Code Clone Size on Clone Evolution
Bouma, G. (2012) · Research Repository (Delft University of Technology)
Improving the Suggestion Making Accuracy of FLeCCS Using Semantics
Hamid, A. A., & Mondal, M. (2026) · Lecture notes in networks and systems · doi:10.1007/978-3-032-04539-3_25
Oumaziz, M. A. (2020) · theses.fr (ABES) · doi:10.70675/122b3075z82d3z4fadza637z3badd5becfd2
Metadata
- Authors
- Duala-Ekoko, E., & Robillard, M. P.
- Affiliations
- McGill University (CA)
- ORCID
- Robillard, Martin P.
- Venue
- 29th International Conference on Software Engineering (ICSE'07)
- Publisher
- IEEE
- Published
- 2007-05
- Pages
- 158-167
- ISSN
- 0270-5257 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W2145544369
- Cited by
- 222
- References
- 27
- Citations by year
- 2026: 1 · 2025: 2 · 2024: 5 · 2023: 6 · 2022: 3 · 2021: 9 · 2020: 9 · 2019: 12 · 2018: 10 · 2017: 6 · 2016: 14 · 2015: 16 · 2014: 13 · 2013: 18 · 2012: 14
- FWCI
- 16.47
- Type
- conference paper
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- ACM/IEEE International Conference on Software Engineering: Companion Proceedings (ICSE-Companion) (publishedVersion)
- Funders
- Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Information Systems › Software Engineering Research
- Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Software › Advanced Software Engineering Methodologies
- Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Information Systems › Software Engineering Techniques and Practices
- Keywords
- code clones, clone detection, evolving software, software maintenance, refactoring
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review