Bots for Pull Requests: The Good, the Bad, and the Promising

Mairieli Wessel; Ahmad  Abdellatif; Igor Scaliante Wiese; Tayana Conte; Emad  Shihab; Marco Aurélio Gerosa; Igor Steinmacher

doi:10.1145/3510003.3512765

Bots for Pull Requests: The Good, the Bad, and the Promising

Mairieli Wessel, Ahmad Abdellatif, Igor Scaliante Wiese, Tayana Conte, Emad Shihab, Marco Aurélio Gerosa, Igor Steinmacher

Software Engineering

Research output: Chapter in Book/Conference proceedings/Edited volume › Conference contribution › Scientific › peer-review

3 Citations (Scopus)

273 Downloads (Pure)

Abstract

Software bots automate tasks within Open Source Software (OSS) projects’ pull requests and save reviewing time and effort (“the good”). However, their interactions can be disruptive and noisy and lead to information overload (“the bad”). To identify strategies to overcome such problems, we applied Design Fiction as a participatory method with 32 practitioners. We elicited 22 design strategies for a bot mediator or the pull request user interface (“the promising”). Participants envisioned a separate place in the pull request interface for bot interactions and a bot mediator that can summarize and customize other bots’ actions to mitigate noise. We also collected participants’ perceptions about a prototype implementing the envisioned strategies. Our design strategies can guide the development of future bots and social coding platforms.

Original language	English
Title of host publication	ICSE '22
Subtitle of host publication	Proceedings of the 44th International Conference on Software Engineering
Place of Publication	New York
Publisher	Association for Computer Machinery
Pages	274-286
Number of pages	13
ISBN (Electronic)	9781450392211
ISBN (Print)	978-1-4503-9221-1
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1145/3510003.3512765
Publication status	Published - 2022

Keywords

Software Bots
GitHub Bots
Human-bot Interaction
Open Source Software
Automation
Collaborative Development
Design Fiction

Access to Document

10.1145/3510003.3512765

ICSE_WESSEL_2022Final published version, 868 KBLicence: CC BY

Cite this

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title = "Bots for Pull Requests: The Good, the Bad, and the Promising",

abstract = "Software bots automate tasks within Open Source Software (OSS) projects{\textquoteright} pull requests and save reviewing time and effort (“the good”). However, their interactions can be disruptive and noisy and lead to information overload (“the bad”). To identify strategies to overcome such problems, we applied Design Fiction as a participatory method with 32 practitioners. We elicited 22 design strategies for a bot mediator or the pull request user interface (“the promising”). Participants envisioned a separate place in the pull request interface for bot interactions and a bot mediator that can summarize and customize other bots{\textquoteright} actions to mitigate noise. We also collected participants{\textquoteright} perceptions about a prototype implementing the envisioned strategies. Our design strategies can guide the development of future bots and social coding platforms. ",

keywords = "Software Bots, GitHub Bots, Human-bot Interaction, Open Source Software, Automation, Collaborative Development, Design Fiction",

author = "Mairieli Wessel and Ahmad Abdellatif and Wiese, {Igor Scaliante} and Tayana Conte and Emad Shihab and Gerosa, {Marco Aur{\'e}lio} and Igor Steinmacher",

year = "2022",

doi = "10.1145/3510003.3512765",

language = "English",

isbn = "978-1-4503-9221-1",

pages = "274--286",

booktitle = "ICSE '22",

publisher = "Association for Computer Machinery",

}

Bots for Pull Requests : The Good, the Bad, and the Promising. / Wessel, Mairieli; Abdellatif, Ahmad; Wiese, Igor Scaliante; Conte, Tayana; Shihab, Emad ; Gerosa, Marco Aurélio; Steinmacher, Igor.

ICSE '22: Proceedings of the 44th International Conference on Software Engineering. New York : Association for Computer Machinery, 2022. p. 274-286.

Research output: Chapter in Book/Conference proceedings/Edited volume › Conference contribution › Scientific › peer-review

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AU - Wessel, Mairieli

AU - Abdellatif, Ahmad

AU - Wiese, Igor Scaliante

AU - Conte, Tayana

AU - Shihab, Emad

AU - Gerosa, Marco Aurélio

AU - Steinmacher, Igor

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AB - Software bots automate tasks within Open Source Software (OSS) projects’ pull requests and save reviewing time and effort (“the good”). However, their interactions can be disruptive and noisy and lead to information overload (“the bad”). To identify strategies to overcome such problems, we applied Design Fiction as a participatory method with 32 practitioners. We elicited 22 design strategies for a bot mediator or the pull request user interface (“the promising”). Participants envisioned a separate place in the pull request interface for bot interactions and a bot mediator that can summarize and customize other bots’ actions to mitigate noise. We also collected participants’ perceptions about a prototype implementing the envisioned strategies. Our design strategies can guide the development of future bots and social coding platforms.

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KW - GitHub Bots

KW - Human-bot Interaction

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KW - Automation

KW - Collaborative Development

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SP - 274

EP - 286

BT - ICSE '22

PB - Association for Computer Machinery

CY - New York

ER -

Bots for Pull Requests: The Good, the Bad, and the Promising

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Keywords

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