Early metrics for object oriented information systems

The quality of object oriented information systems (OOIS) depends greatly on the decisions taken at the initial phases of their development. In a typical object oriented information systems development a class diagram is first built. Class diagrams lay the foundation for all later design work So, their quality heavily affects on the product that will be ultimately implemented Even though the appearance of the Unified Modelling Language (UML) as a standard of modelling OOIS have provided a great contribution towards building quality OOIS, it is not enough. Early availability of metrics is a key factor in the successful management of OOIS development. The goal of this work is to propose a set of metrics in order to assess the complexity of UML class diagrams. We also put the proposed metrics under empirical validation in order to provide empirical support to their practical significance and usefulness.