Abstract

Abstract: Software product lines are an approach to software reuse based on the definition of soft????are similarities and variabilities. The feature models (FM) are the most applied among the notations proposed for modeling variability. The FM community proposed several modeling tools in the last decade. We present a systematic mapping study that evaluates the current state of research on tools for FM, analyzing its application domain, underlying model, origin and degree of validation. This included 32 papers published until 2014 that present 9 tools. 41% of the papers are based on FODA, 53% were proposed by the academy and only 13% of the tools have been empirically validated. Finally, the level of validation is considered insu????cient, especially at the industrial level, and some tools do not support all the characteristics of the FMs.