@ARTICLE{Heider2010,
  author = {Wolfgang Heider and Roman Froschauer and Paul Grünbacher and Rick
	Rabiser and Deepak Dhungana},
  title = {Simulating evolution in model-based product line engineering},
  journal = {Information \& Software Technology},
  year = {2010},
  volume = {52},
  pages = {758-769},
  number = {7},
  abstract = {Numerous approaches are available for modeling product lines and their
	variability. However, the long-term impacts of model-based development
	on maintenance effort and model complexity can hardly be investigated
	due to a lack of empirical data. Conducting empirical research in
	product line engineering is difficult as companies are typically
	reluctant to provide access to data from their product lines. Also,
	many benefits of product lines can be measured only in longitudinal
	studies, which are difficult to perform in most environments. In
	this paper, we thus aim to explore the benefit of simulation to investigate
	the evolution of model-based product lines. We present a simulation
	approach for exploring the effects of product line evolution on model
	complexity and maintenance effort. Our simulation considers characteristics
	of product lines (e.g., size, dependencies in models) and we experiment
	with different evolution profiles (e.g., technical refactoring vs.
	placement of new products). We apply the approach in a simulation
	experiment that uses data from real-world product lines from the
	domain of industrial automation systems to demonstrate its feasibility.
	Our results demonstrate that simulation contributes to understanding
	the effects of maintenance and evolution in model-based product lines.},
  doi = {10.1016/j.infsof.2010.03.007},
  keywords = {CD Lab ASE}
}