Patent ID: 8782001

Claim:
A computer-implemented method for assessing an impact of a database schema change on a software application that accesses a database, the method comprising: receiving, at a processing unit associated with a computer, representation of a proposed database schema change; analyzing code of the software application responsive to said received representation, to identify a portion of the code which accesses a database object identified as being subject of the proposed database schema change; determining a first data set by processing the identified portion of the code using database object slicing for the database object affected by the proposed database schema change; determining a second data set by processing the first data set using a list which includes at least one API property of the code of the software application; applying a set of predetermined rules against the second data set in order to obtain a third data set comprising one or more statements or expressions of affected code portions that produce a different result due to database schema change, impacted code portions to be transformed in order to synchronize it with the proposed database schema change, or invalidated code portions including impacted code that unless modified will produce a runtime error, each code portion having an associated reference; and sending the third data set to an analysis result recipient capable of allowing a user to access, via the reference, at least a portion of the third data set; computing software application code affected by the proposed database schema change by applying a predetermined affected code rule against the second data set in order to obtain a fourth data set comprising the affected software application code; sending the fourth data set to the analysis result recipient operably coupled to an IDE; and recording, by the analysis recipient, of the third data set and the fourth data set in a format accessible by a program transformer.