CodeTimeline: Storytelling with versioning data

Abstract

Working with a software system typically requires knowledge of the system's history, however this knowledge is often only tribal memory of the development team. In past user studies we have observed that when being presented with collaboration views and word clouds from the system's history engineers start sharing memories linked to those visualizations. In this paper we propose an approach based on a storytelling visualization, which is designed to entice engineers to share and document their tribal memory. Sticky notes can be used to share memories of a system's lifetime events, such as past design rationales but also more casual memories like pictures from after-work beer or a hackathon. We present an early-stage prototype implementation and include two design studies created using that prototype.