Related papers: SE Research is a Complex Ecosystem: Isolated Fixes…
The standard assumptions that underlie many conceptual and quantitative frameworks do not hold for many complex physical, biological, and social systems. Complex systems science clarifies when and why such assumptions fail and provides…
Population analysis is crucial for ensuring that empirical software engineering (ESE) research is representative and its findings are valid. Yet, there is a persistent gap between sampling processes and the holistic examination of…
Context: Pre-publication peer review of scientific articles is considered a key element of the research process in software engineering, yet it is often perceived as not to work fully well. Objective: We aim at understanding the perceptions…
Background: Research software plays an important role in solving real-life problems, empowering scientific innovations, and handling emergency situations. Therefore, the correctness and trustworthiness of research software are of absolute…
Open source software ecosystems consist of thousands of interdependent libraries, which users can combine to great effect. Recent work has pointed out two kinds of risks in these systems: that technical problems like bugs and…
Much of software engineering research focuses on tools, algorithms, and optimization of software. Recently, we, as a community, have come to acknowledge that there is a gap in meta-research and addressing the human-factors in software…
Using Large Language Models (LLMs) to address critical societal problems requires adopting this novel technology into socio-technical systems. However, the complexity of such systems and the nature of LLMs challenge such a vision. It is…
Motivations and challenges jointly shape how individuals enter, persist, and evolve within software engineering (SE), yet their interplay remains underexplored across the transition from education to professional practice. We conducted 15…
The disconnect between distributed software artifacts and their supposed source code enables attackers to leverage the build process for inserting malicious functionality. Past research in this field focuses on compiled language ecosystems,…
As the diversity of people in higher education grows, Universities are struggling to provide inclusive environments that nurture the spirit of free inquiry in the presence of these differences. At the extreme, the value of diversity is…
As testified by new regulations like the European AI Act, worries about the human and societal impact of (autonomous) software technologies are becoming of public concern. Human, societal, and environmental values, alongside traditional…
Complex Systems were identified and studied in different fields, such as physics, biology, and economics. These systems exhibit exciting properties such as self-organization, robust order, and emergence. In recent years, software systems…
Software Engineering (SE) agents have shown promising abilities in supporting various SE tasks. Current SE agents remain fundamentally reactive, making decisions mainly based on conversation history and the most recent response. However,…
Systems Engineering (SE) is the set of processes and documentation required for successfully realising large-scale engineering projects, but the classical approach is not a good fit for software-intensive projects, especially when the needs…
Context: With the rising complexity and scale of software systems, there is an ever-increasing demand for sophisticated and cost-effective software testing. To meet such a demand, there is a need for a highly-skilled software testing…
Search-Based Software Engineering (SBSE) is a promising paradigm that exploits the computational search to optimize different processes when engineering complex software systems. Self-adaptive system (SAS) is one category of such complex…
The reproduction and replication of novel results has become a major issue for a number of scientific disciplines. In computer science and related computational disciplines such as systems biology, the issues closely revolve around the…
Large Language Models (LLMs) are increasingly embedded in software engineering (SE) tools, powering applications such as code generation, automated code review, and bug triage. As these LLM-based AI for Software Engineering (AI4SE) systems…
Modern software systems rely on dependency networks of reusable libraries, where breaking changes propagate and cause downstream consumers to fail. Despite growing research across ecosystems, no comprehensive synthesis exists. We conduct a…
This paper reports our extended analysis of the recent literature addressing global software engineering (GSE), using a new Systematic Snapshot Mapping (SSM) technique. The primary purpose of this work is to understand what issues are being…