Journal Article

Accountability in Brazilian Governmental Software Project: How Chat Technology enables Social Translucence in Bug Report Activities

Abstract

Fixing software bug is part of the daily work routine in software engineering which requires collaboration and thus has been explored as a core CSCW domain, since the early inception of the research field. In this paper, we explore the use of chat technology in software engineering by analyzing the coordination between client and vendor in a large government software project in Brazil (Gov-IT). We collected our empirical material through face-to-face and online interviews, site and chat forums observations. Looking closely at the bug fixing activities within Gov-IT, we find that the client and the vendor use chat technology to coordinate their cooperative work by enabling the participants to monitor the availability of developers and the urgency of detecting bugs synchronously. This way, the chat technology made it possible for the client to report bugs and developers to resolve bugs in a timely manner. Moreover, the chat technology enabled the participants to request and share artefacts synchronously, making it possible to analyze and understand the contextual nature surrounding bugs faster than using the bug tracking system. Finally, the chat technology enabled participants in enacting commitment and interdependence across vendor and client, creating cooperative situations of mutual dependence. Our results suggest that we, as CSCW designers, must rethink the design of bug tracking systems and find new ways to re-configure systems, so they support the coordinative practices involved in detecting, analyzing, and resolving critical and severe software bugs synchronously.

Description

Tenório, Nelson; Pinto, Danieli; Bjørn, Pernille (2018): Accountability in Brazilian Governmental Software Project: How Chat Technology enables Social Translucence in Bug Report Activities. Computer Supported Cooperative Work 27(3-4)- ECSCW 2018: Proceedings of the 16th European Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work. DOI: 10.1007/s10606-018-9326-0. Springer, London. PISSN: ISSN 0925-9724. Long Papers. Nancy, France. 4-8 June 2018

Keywords

Coordination, Bug tracking, Chat technology

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Number of citations to item: 5

  • Yibin Fabricius Zhang (2024): Too little or too much transparency? Influencing accountability in project management through the practices of using digital technologies, In: International Journal of Project Management 6(42), doi:10.1016/j.ijproman.2024.102636
  • Nelson Tenório, Pernille Bjørn (2019): Online Harassment in the Workplace: the Role of Technology in Labour Law Disputes, In: Computer Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW) 3-4(28), doi:10.1007/s10606-019-09351-2
  • Jessica Pidoux, Pascale Kuntz, Daniel Gatica-Perez (2021): Declarative Variables in Online Dating, In: Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction CSCW1(5), doi:10.1145/3449174
  • Kássia Rayane Furtado Pereira, Nelson Nunes Tenório Junior, Mariana Santos Oliveira, Cláudia Herrero Martins Menegassi, Thiago Pereira Bento (2020): A GESTÃO DO CONHECIMENTO NO MARKETING DIGITAL: UMA INVESTIGAÇÃO NO USO DO WHATSAPP E A RELAÇÃO ENTRE OS PROCESSOS DE CRIAÇÃO E COMPARTILHAMENTO DO CONHECIMENTO, In: Revista Inteligência Competitiva 4(9), doi:10.24883/iberoamericanic.v9i4.354
  • Pernille Bjørn, Juliane Busboom, Melanie Duckert, Susanne Bødker, Irina Shklovski, Eve Hoggan, Kellie Dunn, Qianqian Mu, Louise Barkhuus, Nina Boulus-Rødje (2024): Achieving Symmetry in Synchronous Interaction in Hybrid Work is Impossible, In: ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction 4(31), doi:10.1145/3648617
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