(i) Branching Activity – which is defined as the ratio of the number of branching changes to the number of development changes, per software component.
(ii) Branching Scatter – which is defined as the ratio of unique branch families that a software component is in, to the number of development changes.
(iii) Branch Scatter Entropy – which is defined as “the entropy (Shannon entropy) of the scatter of the changes to a software component across branch families.” This is related to the percentage of changes done for a software component across branch families. If an equal percentage of changes are performed in all branch families, then the Branch Scatter Entropy will have a maximum value and if all changes are restricted to one of the branch family, then the Entropy will have the least value.
(iv) Branching Depth (Low, Medium, High) – which is defined as “the ratio of development changes to a software component in low/medium/high depth branches.”
(v) Branch Depth Entropy (Low, Medium, High) – which is defined as “the entropy of the changes at each depth level (low, medium, and high).”