📊 CAISE'25: Laboratory Package

This repository contains the laboratory package for the paper CAISE’25, which includes scripts and MiniZinc models to replicate the validation performed in the study. Driven by the paper's main contribution, the primary goal of this package is to leverage the proposed automated analysis formalization and operations, among others, to uncover latent information in SaaS pricing models.

📚 Table of Contents

1. ⚙️ Prerequisites
2. 🚀 How to Replicate the Experiment
3. 📂 Further Explanation About the Package
   • 🔍 Project's Structure
   • 📜 Scripts
   • 📦 Dependencies
4. 📜 License
5. ⚠️ Disclaimer

⚙️ Prerequisites

To run this package, ensure you have the following:

• Node.js: Version 20.x or higher
• NPM: Version 10.x or higher

🚀 How to Replicate the Experiment

To replicate the experiment, follow these simple steps:

1. Clone the repository and checkout to the CAISE'25 tag:

git clone https://github.com/isa-group/SaaS-analysis.git
cd saas-analysis
git checkout dataset/dzn

2. Install the dependencies:

npm install

3. Run the experiment:

npm run experiment

What Happens During the Experiment?

When executing npm run experiment, the following steps are performed:

1. Adding versioning information to the pricing models if they don’t already have it.

2. Generating .dzn files for the MiniZinc models from the Pricing2Yaml specifications. These files are primarily to showcase the results of the mapping from each Pricing2Yaml specification to a DZN file. However, they are not used during the experiment.

3. Extracting analytics from the pricings of the dataset (data/pricings/yaml/real), generating:

   • A JSON file with the extracted analytics in data/pricings/json/.
   • Detailed logs of results and errors in the logs/ directory.

📂 Further Explanation About the Package

🔍 Project’s Structure

saas-analysis
├── .vscode
├── data
│   ├── models
│   │   └── minizinc # Models utilized by Pricing4TS to get some analytics
│   │   │   ├── operations
│   │   │   │   ├── analysis
│   │   │   │   │   ├── cheapest-subscription.mzn
│   │   │   │   │   ├── configuration-space.mzn
│   │   │   │   │   └── most-expensive-subscription.mzn
│   │   │   │   ├── filter
│   │   │   │   │   ├── cheapest-filtered-subscription.mzn
│   │   │   │   │   ├── filter.mzn
│   │   │   │   │   ├── filtered-configuration-space.mzn
│   │   │   │   │   └── most-expensive-filtered-subscription.mzn
│   │   │   │   ├── validation
│   │   │   │   │   ├── valid-pricing.mzn
│   │   │   │   │   └── valid-subscription.mzn
│   │   │   └── PricingModel.mzn
│   └── pricings
│       ├── dzn           # Generated after running the experiment
│       │   └── ...
│       ├── json          # Generated after running the experiment
│       │   └── ...
│       └── yaml
│           └── real      # Input YAML pricing files
│               └── ...
├── logs                  # Generated after running the experiment
├── node_modules          # Generated after running npm install
├── src
│   ├── scripts
│   │   ├── add-version-fields-to-pricings.ts
│   │   ├── extract-analytics-from-file.ts
│   │   ├── extract-analytics.ts
│   │   └── pricings2dzn.ts
│   └── services
│       └── logging.service.ts
├── .gitignore
├── LICENSE
├── package-lock.json
├── package.json
├── README.md
└── tsconfig.json

📜 Scripts

The package includes the following scripts:

Script Name	Description	Usage Command
Extract Analytics¹	Extracts analytics for all SaaS pricings in the dataset.	npm run analytics
File-Based Analytics	Processes analytics from a specific file.	npm run analytics-from-file <path-to-pricing-file>
Add Versions	Adds missing versioning information to pricing models.	npm run add-versions-to-pricings
Generate DZN Files	Converts pricing models into .dzn files for MiniZinc.	npm run generate-dzn-files
Experiment Workflow	Executes the full pipeline of the experiment.	npm run experiment

¹The Extract Analytics script leverages the PricingService from our library Pricing4TS. This library, developed as part of our Pricing-driven Development and Operation research initiatives, was specifically extended with the automated analysis formalization and operations presented in the paper.

By leveraging this service, more specifically its method getAnalytics(pricing: Pricing), the script processes all pricing files located in the data/pricings/yaml/real directory, applies the analytics extraction method to each file and generates the outputs described earlier: a JSON file containing the extracted analytics (data/pricings/json/) and detailed logs of results and errors (logs/).

📦 Dependencies

Production Dependencies

• cli-progress: For progress visualization.
• @types/cli-progress: Type definitions for cli-progress.

Development Dependencies

• typescript: Enables TypeScript support.
• jest & ts-jest: For testing.
• ts-node: To run TypeScript files directly.

⚠️ Disclaimer

This project is part of the research activities of the ISA Group and was specifically created as a laborratory package for the paper: CAISE'25. Please note that the project should be used with caution. We are not responsible for any damage caused by the use of this software. If you find any bugs or have any suggestions, please let us know by opening an issue in the GitHub repository with the label: CAISE'25.

📜 License

This work is licensed under a [Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License] cc-by.