Comparing pre‐commit reviews and post‐commit reviews using process simulation

Abstract

Code review in practice is often performed change‐based, ie, using the code changes belonging to a task to determine which code to review. Previous studies found that 2 variations of this process are used in industry: pre‐commit review and post‐commit review. The choice between these has implications not only for practitioners deciding on a code review process to use but also for the development of review tools and for experimentation with review processes. In some situations, a specific variant is clearly preferable due to the nature of the development process or team. In other situations, there are conflicting opinions. So we asked: Are there practically relevant performance differences between pre and post‐commit reviews? How are these differences influenced by contextual factors? To assess these questions, we designed a parametric discrete event simulation model of certain agile development processes. We validated this model with practitioner's feedback and in part also with empirical data from industry. Our analysis indicates that the best choice does depend on the context but also that there are many situations with no practically relevant difference between both choices. We identified the main influencing factors and underlying effects and condensed our findings into heuristic rules.

Agile practices and the promotion of entrepreneurial skills in software development

“…Therefore, this research uses “convenience sampling” and not probabilistic sampling . It is worth noting that Ahmad et al, Alahyari et al, Baum et al, Crabtree et al, Garousi et al, Graziotin et al, Petersen et al, and Verner et al are some of the works who have used convenience sampling in research in the software development area.…”

Assessing the Risk of Software Development in Agile Methodologies Using Simulation

“…Practical examples of the use of SPSM are the works by Baum et al [10], who compares pre-commit reviews and post-commit reviews using process simulation through a parametric discrete event simulation model of a given development process, and by Zhao et al [54] who present a fine-grained dynamic micro-simulation system based on an agent model at the project level for Open Source Software Development.…”

Situational Factors for Modern Code Review to Support Software Engineers’ Sustainability

“…Technology: It refers to the approaches, skills, and processes used in the creation of goods or services in the achievement of aims [49]. The situational factors included in this category are process, tool, technology maturity, technology accessibility, and training [18], [26], [31], [34] [41] [43], [61], [62], [63], [64].…”

“…Situational software engineering ensures the software engineers' sustainability [9], [11], [15]. The previous work established that researchers have highlighted the significance of situational factors identification and attention has been given on the identification of situational factors in software requirement and for software development [3], [8], [9], [10], [11], [12], however, little indication is available concerning to Modern Code Review (MCR) [30], [31], [32], [33], [34]. It results in the unavailability of situational guidelines that can help software engineers to increase their competency for the identification of situational factors.…”