research-article

Impacts of coding practices on readability

Authors:

Rodrigo Magalhães dos Santos,

Marco Aurélio GerosaAuthors Info & Claims

ICPC '18: Proceedings of the 26th Conference on Program Comprehension

Pages 277 - 285

https://doi.org/10.1145/3196321.3196342

Published: 28 May 2018 Publication History

Abstract

Several conventions and standards aim to improve maintainability of software code. However, low levels of code readability perceived by developers still represent a barrier to their daily work. In this paper, we describe a survey that assessed the impact of a set of Java coding practices on the readability perceived by software developers. While some practices promoted an enhancement of readability, others did not show statistically significant effects. Interestingly, one of the practices worsened the readability. Our results may help to identify coding conventions with a positive impact on readability and, thus, guide the creation of coding standards.

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https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3613904.3642512
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Published In

cover image ACM Conferences

ICPC '18: Proceedings of the 26th Conference on Program Comprehension

May 2018

423 pages

ISBN:9781450357142

DOI:10.1145/3196321

General Chair:
Foutse Khomh
École Polytechnique de Montréal, Canada
,
Program Chairs:
Chanchal K. Roy
University of Saskatchewan, Canada
,
Janet Siegmund
University of Passau, Germany

Copyright © 2018 ACM.

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Published: 28 May 2018

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ICSE '18: 40th International Conference on Software Engineering

May 28 - 29, 2018

Gothenburg, Sweden

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Cited By

Pandey MOney SBegel A(2024)Towards Inclusive Source Code Readability Based on the Preferences of Programmers with Visual ImpairmentsProceedings of the 2024 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems10.1145/3613904.3642512(1-18)Online publication date: 11-May-2024
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3613904.3642512
Niazi TDas TAhmed GWaqas SKhan SKhan SAbdelatif AWasi S(2023)Investigating Novice Developers’ Code Commenting Trends Using Machine Learning TechniquesAlgorithms10.3390/a1601005316:1(53)Online publication date: 12-Jan-2023
https://doi.org/10.3390/a16010053
Kapoor AXie TKwan LGardner-Mccune CDoyle MStephenson BDorn BSoh LBattestilli L(2023)Logistics, Affordances, and Evaluation of Build ProgrammingProceedings of the 54th ACM Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education V. 110.1145/3545945.3569756(179-185)Online publication date: 2-Mar-2023
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3545945.3569756
Takebayashi TPeruma AMkaouer MNewman C(2023)An Exploratory Study on the Usage and Readability of Messages Within Assertion Methods of Test Cases2023 IEEE/ACM 2nd International Workshop on Natural Language-Based Software Engineering (NLBSE)10.1109/NLBSE59153.2023.00015(32-39)Online publication date: May-2023
https://doi.org/10.1109/NLBSE59153.2023.00015
Moradi Dakhel AMajdinasab VNikanjam AKhomh FDesmarais MJiang Z(2023)GitHub Copilot AI pair programmerJournal of Systems and Software10.1016/j.jss.2023.111734203:COnline publication date: 1-Sep-2023
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Oliveira DSantos RMadeiral FMasuhara HCastor F(2023)A systematic literature review on the impact of formatting elements on code legibilityJournal of Systems and Software10.1016/j.jss.2023.111728203:COnline publication date: 1-Sep-2023
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Wessel MVargovich JGerosa MTreude C(2023)GitHub Actions: The Impact on the Pull Request ProcessEmpirical Software Engineering10.1007/s10664-023-10369-w28:6Online publication date: 26-Sep-2023
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Becker POlsina LPapa M(2023)Approach to Improving Java Source Code Considering Non-compliance with a Java Style GuideComputer Science – CACIC 202210.1007/978-3-031-34147-2_9(123-139)Online publication date: 27-May-2023
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Barbosa LPinto Vde Souza APinto G(2022)To What Extent Cognitive-Driven Development Improves Code Readability?Proceedings of the 16th ACM / IEEE International Symposium on Empirical Software Engineering and Measurement10.1145/3544902.3546241(238-248)Online publication date: 19-Sep-2022
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Mi QWang LHu LOu LYu Y(2022)Improving Multi-Class Code Readability Classification with An Enhanced Data Augmentation Approach (130)International Journal of Software Engineering and Knowledge Engineering10.1142/S0218194022500656(1-23)Online publication date: 18-Nov-2022
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