Problems and opportunities for model-centric versus code-centric software development

We present some results of a survey of 113 software practitioners conducted between April and December 2007. The aim of the survey was to uncover their attitudes and experiences regarding software modeling, and development approaches that avoid modeling. We were motivated by observations that modeling is not widely adopted; many developers continue to take a code-centric approach. Key findings overall include: Modeling tools are primarily used to create documentation and for up-front design with little code generation; and participants believe that model-centric approaches to software engineering are easier but are currently not very popular as most participants currently work in code-centric environments. Key findings from sub-samples include: problems identified with model-centric approaches are similar regardless of a participant's country. Programmers that model extensively (versus those that do not model much) are more likely to agree that models become out of date and inconsistent with code.