Probabilistic Model Checking GitHub Repositories for Software Project Analysis

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The manuscript plunges the reader into the world of software engineering. Hardware and software engineering have a lot in common. Initially the design support for hardware developed faster, because of the larger amount of design restrictions. But eventually software engineering caught up and turned into a separate discipline. Complex systems offer less restrictions: hence the overall project engineering is software-dominated offering a need for its own expert community.

 

The authors point out that especially gaps have to be closed in repository structure, branch management and participants analysis. It was driven by advances in model checking and probabilistic theorems in the way that have been shown to be effective for architectures. In some sense, the authors attempt to overview the potential technologies to fill the design gaps. They illustrate the state of the art by applying five typical cases within the GitHub framework.

 

The paper has been nicely written and well structured. The research goal is clearly stated, though the target is shared with the GitHub community. In that sense the conventional laws of science will need to be re-qualified as aspects as “innovation” have move into higher, less-physical realms. Nevertheless, illustrations should be needed in a meaningful (the drawing space should be fully filled) and quantifiable (the axis’ requires legends for numerical understanding) way.

 

The classical view on science demands the novelty level for the specific writers. Nowadays, the composition gets more value. In a typical industrial lab, each designer needs to master at least two technologies and a fresh look on applications. This is also driven by the fact that half of any knowledge will get old-fashioned in 2 years. To motor such current project development, manuscripts like the one offered by the authors are needed. Therefore I am interested to hear where their experimental cases are meant to drive the next development.

 

Usually the reviewer is supposed to mark errors are missing elements. This is not what I did. The first reason is that the proposed paper is complete in some sense. The second reason is that ’review comments’ will only hijack the paper into a different direction. But they can polish the proposed paper, preferably as I tried to suggest in the above.

Author Response

Thank you for your insightful review and feedback and our responses is as follows:

- Fixed figure sizes in Figures 1, 2, and 3.
- We have revised Figure 7 and 10.
- I believe that the proposed research can be used to drive new projects, or to determine the health or status of team members during the course of a project. The various quantitative figures can be a basis for judgment.
- In the future, I would like to study whether these results can be reflected well in practice.

Thank you again for your valuable suggestions.

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

1. **Clarification on Methodology Choice**:

   - "The paper presents an interesting approach using Discrete-Time Markov Chains (DTMCs) and Probabilistic Computation Tree Logic (PCTL) for the analysis of GitHub repositories. To strengthen the reader's understanding, could you provide more detailed justification for the selection of DTMC and PCTL as the primary analytical tools? Elaborating on their specific advantages or suitability in this context, compared to other potential methods, would greatly enhance the paper's methodological clarity."

 

2. **Consideration of Alternative Methods**:

   - "While the use of DTMC and PCTL is innovative, it would be beneficial to discuss alternative methodologies that could also be applied to this type of analysis. Have other methods such as machine learning models, regression analysis, graph-based models, or natural language processing been considered? A comparative discussion on these alternatives, highlighting why DTMC and PCTL were preferred over these methods, or how they might complement your current approach, would significantly contribute to the paper's comprehensiveness and depth."

 

3. **Incorporation of Generative AI**:

   - "Given the growing interest and advancements in generative AI, have you considered incorporating generative AI techniques based on the observations from your analysis? Exploring the potential application of generative AI to enhance or supplement your findings could be a novel and valuable addition to your research. This could include generating predictive models, simulating repository behavior, or automating certain aspects of project management."

 

4. **Addition of a Related Works Section**:

   - "To contextualize your research within the broader field, I recommend adding a 'Related Works' section. This section should summarize similar previous studies, detailing how your approach and findings differ from or build upon these works. Including a feature comparison table to visually contrast your methodology and findings with existing research could provide valuable context and further highlight the unique contributions of your paper."

 

Comments on the Quality of English Language

Accept with minor revision

Author Response

Thank you for your kind comments and our responses is as follows:

- In the Background, Discussion, and Conclusions sections, we have explained our justification for using DTMC and PCTL as our main analysis tools.
- Due to scope constraints, we did not include generative AI, but it is something we could consider for future research.
- We did not add a related work section as we believe our discussion sufficiently covers these aspects.

Thank you again for your valuable suggestions.

Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

In summary, there is not much to criticize about the draft. It is well written and structured. Right from the beginning the intention of the research becomes obvious for the reader. Maybe at the end of section 1, the actual research questions could be added. In line 59 the three most important aspects are mentioned. Based on those, the research intention could be formulated and answered as well as concluded in Section 6. This would help to further infuse structure into the draft.

Some minimal suggestions for an update of the grammar are mentioned in the comments about the language

So in general, only minor updates are recommended.

Comments on the Quality of English Language

The grammar and language are very good. Anyhow, here some details and small mistakes are listed, that should be corrected:

When citing the references at the end of a sentence, a whitespace should be included between the last word and the opening bracket [. Cf. lines 115, 120, ...

When mentioning the Figures in the text, the actual Figure should be placed underneath. For the reader it is more efficient to read about the content of the Figure and find it below.

Line 221: A separation of “Figure” and “2-(a)” should be avoided. For a blocked whitespace, use STRG+Shift+Space in Word.

Line 237: Please change “Additionally, an additional”

Line 251 or 284: A Figure in the middle of a sentence should be avoided.

Line 314: The “s” might be inside of the “”?!?

Line 379 and 384: Update “participant participated”!

Line 516: Update “pull a pull request”!

Line 545: The sentence starting with “By...” is not understandable. Please update!

The format of the references should be proved. At the beginning the release years are written in bold letters.

Author Response

Thank you for your helpful suggestions and our responses is as follows:

- We have made the grammatical, linguistic, and structural changes you pointed out (lines 221, 237, 251, 314, 379, 384, 516 and 545).
- Regarding the addition of research questions, we feel that the discussion section comprehensively covers the intent and implications of the study, and we appreciate your thoughtful insights.

Thank you again for your valuable suggestions.

Reviewer 4 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The article presents a new methodology to analyze GitHub activity which is different from traditional methods. The paper is well presented, organized, and also includes a well documented exaamples of the novel method proposed. However, in my opinion there are two parts in the paper which can be improved. First, in the introduction a paragraph reviewing the "old methods" is missing. In other words, if the proposal of the authors is new which are the aold methods? please make a survey. Second, in the section of the results or in the discusion a paragraph of comparison of their results with the oldest results is also missing.

On the other hand there are some misprints, for instance:

- The punctuation of equations: line 125 "." at the end of state formula should be inserted, etc. 

-Line 115, “systems[21] “ should be ““systems [21] “ (similar observation in line 120, etc)

 

In conclusion the paper should be accepted under minor modifications.

Author Response

Thank you for your kind comments and our responses is as follows:

- Previous papers analyzing GitHub are introduced in the discussion section. In this section, we explained the differences between our method and the existing methods that analyze GitHub with various techniques. Therefore, we focused on our methodology and results in the main body of the paper.
- Fixed lines 115, 120.

Thank you again for your valuable suggestions.