An automated tool to assist in the understanding of legacy code components can be useful
both in the areas of software reuse and software maintenance. Most previous work in this area
has concentrated on functionally-oriented code. Whereas object-oriented code has been shown
to be inherently more reusable than functionally-oriented code, in many cases the eventual
reuse of the object-oriented code was not considered during development. A knowledge-based,
natural language processing approach to the automated understanding of object-oriented code
as an aid to the reuse of object-oriented code is described. A system, called the PATRicia
system (Program Analysis Tool for Reuse) that implements the approach is examined. The
natural language processing/information extraction system that comprises a large part of the
PATRicia system is discussed and the knowledge-base of the PATRicia system, in the form
of conceptual graphs, is described. Reports provided by natural language-generation in the
PATRicia system are described.