How to better utilize code graphs in semantic code search?
Yucen Shi, Ying Yin, Zhengkui Wang, David Lo, Tao Zhang, Xin Xia, Yuhai Zhao, Bowen Xu
2022Proceedings of the 30th ACM Joint European Software Engineering Conference and Symposium on the Foundations of Software Engineering23 citationsDOIOpen Access PDF
Abstract
Semantic code search greatly facilitates software reuse, which enables users to find code snippets highly matching user-specified natural language queries. Due to the rich expressive power of code graphs (e.g., control-flow graph and program dependency graph), both of the two mainstream research works (i.e., multi-modal models and pre-trained models) have attempted to incorporate code graphs for code modelling. However, they still have some limitations: First, there is still much room for improvement in terms of search effectiveness. Second, they have not fully considered the unique features of code graphs.
Topics & Concepts
Computer scienceProgramming languageCode reuseCode generationCode (set theory)Dependency graphTheoretical computer scienceControl flow graphReuseGraphSoftwareBiologySet (abstract data type)Computer securityEcologyKey (lock)Software Engineering ResearchTopic ModelingSoftware Testing and Debugging Techniques