Comparison methods in a decision support system for determining JavaScript frameworks

Abstract

The selection of an appropriate JavaScript framework in web-based software development often leads to errors when the chosen framework is incompatible with the design. The ability to make decisions quickly, accurately, and precisely is therefore a key factor in successful software design. Addressing this need, the present study analyzes the accuracy of the analytical hierarchy process-weight product (AHP-WP), analytical hierarchy process-technique for order preference by similarity to ideal solution (AHP TOPSIS), and analytical hierarchy process-simple multi-attribute rating technique (AHP-SMART) methods in determining the most suitable JavaScript framework according to the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) 9126 classification. To evaluate accuracy, the mean absolute percentage error (MAPE) was applied as a cost function to measure the error percentage of each method. The analysis was conducted on ten popular JavaScript frameworks selected based on their popularity and usage trends. The evaluation considered six quality criteria: functionality, reliability, usability, efficiency, maintainability, and portability. The results show the ranking of each alternative for all methods. Accuracy measurement using MAPE revealed that the AHP-WP method produced the smallest error percentage (37.77645%), compared to AHP-TOPSIS (47.12566%) and AHP-SMART (46.4041%). Accordingly, the AHP-WP method is recommended for decision support system (DSS) development.