TY - GEN
T1 - Representations of user feedback in an agile, collocated software team
AU - Lee, Michael J.
AU - Ko, Andrew J.
PY - 2012
Y1 - 2012
N2 - Support requests are a major source of feedback in software development. However, like sentences whispered in a children's telephone game, as an issue moves through a software development process, it may undergo many changes, making it difficult to ensure that the problem reported was actually fixed. To better understand how software teams preserve the integrity of user-reported issues, we observed a software team over a 6-month period, analyzing the trajectory of user requests through their software development processes. Our observations revealed several representations of issues, highlighting several points where information about an issue was lost or transformed. Although this information loss appeared to be unavoidable as an issue went through the resolution process, we found it was offset by a web of transactive memory distributed throughout the support and product teams. This memory was reinforced by asynchronous chat about recent and commonly reported issues, and shared notions of what issues should be considered severe or urgent.
AB - Support requests are a major source of feedback in software development. However, like sentences whispered in a children's telephone game, as an issue moves through a software development process, it may undergo many changes, making it difficult to ensure that the problem reported was actually fixed. To better understand how software teams preserve the integrity of user-reported issues, we observed a software team over a 6-month period, analyzing the trajectory of user requests through their software development processes. Our observations revealed several representations of issues, highlighting several points where information about an issue was lost or transformed. Although this information loss appeared to be unavoidable as an issue went through the resolution process, we found it was offset by a web of transactive memory distributed throughout the support and product teams. This memory was reinforced by asynchronous chat about recent and commonly reported issues, and shared notions of what issues should be considered severe or urgent.
KW - User-centered design
KW - feedback
KW - issue tracking
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84864153027&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=84864153027&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1109/CHASE.2012.6223028
DO - 10.1109/CHASE.2012.6223028
M3 - Conference contribution
AN - SCOPUS:84864153027
SN - 9781467318242
T3 - 2012 5th International Workshop on Co-operative and Human Aspects of Software Engineering, CHASE 2012 - Proceedings
SP - 76
EP - 82
BT - 2012 5th International Workshop on Co-operative and Human Aspects of Software Engineering, CHASE 2012 - Proceedings
T2 - 2012 5th International Workshop on Co-operative and Human Aspects of Software Engineering, CHASE 2012
Y2 - 2 June 2012 through 2 June 2012
ER -