Do Words Have Power? Understanding and Fostering Civility in Code Review Discussion
Modern Code Review (MCR) is an integral part of the software development process where developers improve product quality through collaborative discussions. Unfortunately, these discussions can sometimes become heated by the presence of inappropriate behaviors, often referred to as incivility. The negative behaviors encompass personal attacks, insults, disrespectful comments, and derogatory conduct. While researchers have extensively explored such incivility in various public domains, our understanding of its causes, consequences, and courses of action remains limited within the professional context of software development, specifically within code review discussions. To bridge this gap, our study draws upon the experience of 171 professional software developers representing diverse development practices across different geographical regions. Our findings reveal that more than half of these developers (i.e., 56.72%) have encountered instances of workplace incivility, and a substantial portion of that group (83.70%) reported experiencing such incidents at least once a month. We also identified various causes, positive and negative consequences, and potential courses of action for uncivil communication. Moreover, to address the negative aspects of incivility, we propose a model for promoting civility that detects uncivil comments during communication and provides alternative civil suggestions while preserving the original comments’ semantics, enabling developers to engage in respectful and constructive discussions. An analysis of four sentiment analyzers using 2K uncivil review comments, followed by a manual evaluation, stated that the generated civil alternatives significantly enhanced the comment sentiments positively. Moreover, a survey involving 36 developers who used our civility model reported its effectiveness in enhancing online development interactions, fostering better relationships, increasing contributor involvement, and expediting development processes. Our research is a pioneer in generating civil alternatives for uncivil discussions in software development, opening new avenues for research in collaboration and communication within the software engineering context.
Thu 18 JulDisplayed time zone: Brasilia, Distrito Federal, Brazil change
15:30 - 16:00 | |||
15:30 30mPoster | Can GPT-4 Replicate Empirical Software Engineering Research? Posters Jenny T. Liang Carnegie Mellon University, Carmen Badea Microsoft Research, Christian Bird Microsoft Research, Robert DeLine Microsoft Research, Denae Ford Microsoft Research, Nicole Forsgren Microsoft Research, Thomas Zimmermann Microsoft Research | ||
15:30 30mPoster | Evaluating Directed Fuzzers: Are We Heading in the Right Direction? Posters Tae Eun Kim KAIST, Jaeseung Choi Sogang University, Seongjae Im KAIST, Kihong Heo KAIST, Sang Kil Cha KAIST Link to publication Media Attached File Attached | ||
15:30 30mPoster | Glitch Tokens in Large Language Models: Categorization Taxonomy and Effective Detection Posters Yuxi Li Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Yi Liu Nanyang Technological University, Gelei Deng Nanyang Technological University, Ying Zhang Virginia Tech, Wenjia Song Virginia Tech, Ling Shi Nanyang Technological University, Kailong Wang Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Yuekang Li The University of New South Wales, Yang Liu Nanyang Technological University, Haoyu Wang Huazhong University of Science and Technology | ||
15:30 30mPoster | Do Words Have Power? Understanding and Fostering Civility in Code Review Discussion Posters Md Shamimur Rahman University of Saskatchewan, Canada, Zadia Codabux University of Saskatchewan, Chanchal K. Roy University of Saskatchewan, Canada | ||
15:30 30mPoster | CodePlan: Repository-level Coding using LLMs and Planning Posters Ramakrishna Bairi Microsoft Research, India, Atharv Sonwane Microsoft Research, India, Aditya Kanade Microsoft Research, India, Vageesh D C Microsoft Research, India, Arun Iyer Microsoft Research, India, Suresh Parthasarathy Microsoft Research, India, Sriram Rajamani Microsoft Research Indua, B. Ashok Microsoft Research. India, Shashank Shet Microsoft Research. India | ||
15:30 30mPoster | Understanding and Detecting Annotation-induced Faults of Static Analyzers Posters Huaien Zhang The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Southern University of Science and Technology, Yu Pei The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Shuyun Liang Southern University of Science and Technology, Shin Hwei Tan Concordia University | ||
15:30 30mPoster | Partial Solution Based Constraint Solving Cache in Symbolic Execution Posters Ziqi Shuai School of Computer, National University of Defense Technology, China, Zhenbang Chen College of Computer, National University of Defense Technology, Kelin Ma School of Computer, National University of Defense Technology, China, Kunlin Liu School of Computer, National University of Defense Technology, China, Yufeng Zhang Hunan University, Jun Sun School of Information Systems, Singapore Management University, Singapore, Ji Wang School of Computer, National University of Defense Technology, China | ||
15:30 30mPoster | Characterizing Python Library Migrations Posters Mohayeminul Islam University of Alberta, Ajay Jha North Dakota State University, Ildar Akhmetov Northeastern University, Sarah Nadi New York University Abu Dhabi, University of Alberta File Attached | ||
15:30 30mPoster | DeSQL: Interactive Debugging of SQL in Data-Intensive Scalable Computing Posters | ||
15:30 30mPoster | BARO: Robust Root Cause Analysis for Microservices via Multivariate Bayesian Online Change Point Detection Posters | ||
15:30 30mPoster | Less Cybersickness, Please: Demystifying and Detecting Stereoscopic Visual Inconsistencies in Virtual Reality Applications Posters Shuqing Li The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Cuiyun Gao Harbin Institute of Technology, Jianping Zhang The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Yujia Zhang Harbin Institute of Technology, Yepang Liu Southern University of Science and Technology, Jiazhen Gu The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Yun Peng The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Michael Lyu The Chinese University of Hong Kong | ||
15:30 30mPoster | CORE: Resolving Code Quality Issues Using LLMs Posters Nalin Wadhwa Microsoft Research, India, Jui Pradhan Microsoft Research, India, Atharv Sonwane Microsoft Research, India, Surya Prakash Sahu Microsoft Research, India, Nagarajan Natarajan Microsoft Research India, Aditya Kanade Microsoft Research, India, Suresh Parthasarathy Microsoft Research, India, Sriram Rajamani Microsoft Research Indua | ||
15:30 30mPoster | Abstraction-Aware Inference of Metamorphic Relations Posters Agustin Nolasco University of Rio Cuarto, Facundo Molina IMDEA Software Institute, Renzo Degiovanni Luxembourg Institute of Science and Technology, Alessandra Gorla IMDEA Software Institute, Diego Garbervetsky Departamento de Computación, FCEyN, UBA, Mike Papadakis University of Luxembourg, Sebastian Uchitel Imperial College and University of Buenos Aires, Nazareno Aguirre University of Rio Cuarto and CONICET, Marcelo F. Frias Dept. of Software Engineering Instituto Tecnológico de Buenos Aires | ||
15:30 30mPoster | State Reconciliation Defects in Infrastructure as Code Posters Md Mahadi Hassan Auburn University, John Salvador Auburn University, Shubhra Kanti Karmaker Santu Auburn University, Akond Rahman Auburn University | ||
This room is conjoined with the Foyer to provide additional space for the coffee break, and hold poster presentations throughout the event.