Reputation-based self-management of software process artifact quality in consortium research projects

Abstract

This paper proposes a PhD research that deals with improving internal documentation in software projects. Software developers often do not like to create documentation because it has few value to the individual himself. Yet the purpose of internal documentation is to help others understand the software and the problem it addresses. Documentation increases development speed, reduces software maintenance costs, helps to keep development on track, and mitigates the negative effects of distance in distributed settings. This research aims to increase the individuals' motivation to write documentation by means of reputation. The CollabReview prototype is a web-based reputation system that analyzes artifacts of internal documentation to derive personal reputation scores. Developers making many good contributions will achieve higher reputation scores. These scores can then be employed to softly influence developer behavior, e.g. by incentivizing them to contribute to documentation with social rewards. No strict rule enforcement is necessary.