Abstract: With the development and increasingly mature of Internet and software technology, software system is facing with the characteristic of uncertain using pattern and complex dynamic interaction behavior. This paper analysised the topological measure characteristics in software execution network based on the complex network. Take three typical open-source software running in Linux as an example, first the software execution log and according to the calls relationship of methods the execution network were established, and then typical topological metrics like connectivity, network diameter and density, average path length, degree distributions, degree correlations, clustering coefficient, between- ness centrality and closeness were analyzed in the software execution network, also make comparison with software structural network based on static code association. The results show that execution behavior have dynamic changes and restructuring phenomenon in the software execution process, compared with the structural network the topological characteristics in the execution network have many difference, the average path length becomes smaller in the perform network,the small-world character tends to disappear. Explore software execution behavior rules has important guiding significance for the software maintenance management and quality assurance.

Key words: Complex network, Open-source software, Dynamic execution, Function call, Structural characteristic