ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Comput. Sci.
Sec. Software
Volume 7 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fcomp.2025.1516410
This article is part of the Research TopicMachine Learning for Software EngineeringView all 6 articles
A Comparison of Large Language Models and Model-Driven Reverse Engineering for Reverse Engineering
Provisionally accepted
- King's College London, London, United Kingdom
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Large language models (LLMs) have been extensively researched for programming-related tasks, including program summarisation, over recent years. However, the task of abstracting formal specifications from code using LLMs has been less explored. Precise program analysis approaches based on model-driven reverse engineering (MDRE) have also been researched, and in this paper we compare the results of the LLM and MDRE approaches on tasks of abstracting Python and Java programs to the OCL formal language. We also define a combined approach which achieves improved results.
Keywords: Program abstraction, reverse engineering, LLMS, Model-driven reverse engineering (MDRE), Object constraint language
Received: 24 Oct 2024; Accepted: 08 Jul 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Siala and Lano. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Kevin Lano, King's College London, London, United Kingdom
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