@proceedings {9999, title = {Coordination in OSS 2.0: ANT Approach}, year = {2019}, abstract = {

Open source software projects are increasingly driven by a combination of independent and professional developers, the former volunteers and the later hired by a company to contribute to the project to support commercial product development. This mix of developers has been referred to as OSS 2.0. However, we do not fully understand the multi-layered coordination spanning individuals, teams, and organizations. Using Actor-Network Theory (ANT), we describe how coordination and power dynamics unfold among developers and how different tools and artifacts both display activities and mediate coordination efforts. Internal communication within an organization was reported to cause broken links in the community, duplication of work, and political tensions. ANT shows how tools and code can exercise agency and alter a software development process as an equivalently active actor of the scene. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of the changing nature of open source software development.

}, keywords = {actor-network theory, free/libre open source, Stigmergy}, doi = {10.24251/HICSS.2019.120}, url = { http://hdl.handle.net/10125/59538}, attachments = {https://crowston.syr.edu./sites/crowston.syr.edu/files/hicss52a-sub2136-cam-i8-2.pdf}, author = {Sangseok You and Kevin Crowston and Jeffery Saltz and Yatish Hegde} } @proceedings {9999, title = {Helping data science students develop task modularity}, year = {2019}, abstract = {

This paper explores the skills needed to be a data scientist. Specifically, we report on a mixed method study of a project-based data science class, where we evaluated student effectiveness with respect to dividing a project into appropriately sized modular tasks, which we termed task modularity. Our results suggest that while data science students can appreciate the value of task modularity, they struggle to achieve effective task modularity. As a first step, based our study, we identified six task decomposition best practices. However, these best practices do not fully address this gap of how to enable data science students to effectively use task modularity. We note that while computer science/information system programs typically teach modularity (e.g., the decomposition process and abstraction), and there remains a need identify a corresponding model to that used for computer science / information system students, to teach modularity to data science students.

}, keywords = {data science, modularity, Stigmergy}, doi = {10.24251/HICSS.2019.134}, url = {http://hdl.handle.net/10125/59549}, attachments = {https://crowston.syr.edu./sites/crowston.syr.edu/files/modularity-HICSS-final-afterReview.pdf}, author = {Jeffery Saltz and Heckman, Robert and Kevin Crowston and Sangseok You and Yatish Hegde} } @proceedings {9999, title = {Stigmergic coordination in Wikipedia}, year = {2018}, abstract = {

We examine a novel approach to coordination, namely stigmergic coordination, that is, coordination mediated by changes to a shared work product. Stigmergy stands in contrast to the two coordination approaches identified in the existing literature on coordination, explicit coordination, based on direct communication through discussion page or user talk pages, and implicit coordination, based on unspoken expectations and shared mental models of the task to be accomplished. We look for evidence of stigmergic coordination in the context of Wikipedia, as one of the most successful experiments in online collaborative knowledge building. Using a novel approach to identifying edits to the same part of a Wikipedia article, we show that a majority of edits to two example articles are not associated with discussion on the article Talk page, suggesting the possibility of stigmergic coordination. However, some amount of discussion does seem to be related to article quality, suggesting the limits to this approach to coordination.

}, keywords = {Coordination, distributed groups, on-line epistemic community, Stigmergy, Wikipedia}, url = {http://www.opensym.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/OpenSym2018_paper_34.pdf}, attachments = {https://crowston.syr.edu./sites/crowston.syr.edu/files/stigmergic-coordination-wikipedia\%20final.pdf}, author = {Amira Rezgui and Kevin Crowston} } @article {2017, title = {Work~features to support stigmergic coordination in distributed teams}, year = {2017}, type = {Interactive paper}, abstract = {

When work products are shared via a computer system, members of distributed teams can see the work products produced by remote colleagues as easily as those from local colleagues. Drawing on coordination theory and work in computer-supported cooperative work (CSCW), we theorize that these work products can provide information to support team coordination, that is, that work can be coordinated through the outcome of the work itself, a mode of coordination analogous to the biological process of stigmergy. Based on studies of documents and work, we postulate three features of work products that enable them to support team coordination, namely having a clear genre, being visible and mobile, and being combinable. These claims are illustrated with examples drawn from free/libre open source software development teams. We conclude by discussing how the proposed theory might be empirically tested.

}, keywords = {Coordination, Stigmergy}, attachments = {https://crowston.syr.edu./sites/crowston.syr.edu/files/Stigmergy\%20theory\%20paper\%20to\%20share.pdf}, author = {Kevin Crowston and James Howison and Bolici, Francesco and Carsten {\O}sterlund} } @article {9998, title = {Stigmergic coordination in FLOSS development teams: Integrating explicit and implicit mechanisms}, journal = {Cognitive Systems Research}, volume = {38}, year = {2016}, pages = {14{\textendash}22}, keywords = {Coordination, Stigmergy}, doi = {10.1016/j.cogsys.2015.12.003}, attachments = {https://crowston.syr.edu./sites/crowston.syr.edu/files/COGSYS-RS-\%28HHS\%29-\%282015\%29-\%283\%29.pdf}, author = {Bolici, Francesco and James Howison and Kevin Crowston} } @article {2010, title = {The under-appreciated role of stigmergic coordination in software development}, year = {2010}, abstract = {

Coordination in software development teams has been a topic of perennial interest in empirical software engineering research. The vast majority of this literature has drawn on a conceptual separation between work and coordination mechanisms, separate from the work itself, which enable groups to achieve coordination. Traditional recommendations and software methods focused on planning: using analysis to predict and manage dependencies. Empirical research has demonstrated the limits of this approach, showing that many important dependencies are emergent and pointing to the persistent importance of explicit discussion to managing these dependencies as they arise. Drawing on work in Computer-Supported Collaborative Work and building from an analogy to collaboration amongst insects (stigmergy), we argue that the work product itself plays an under-appreciated role in helping software developers manage dependencies as they arise. This short paper presents the conceptual argument with empirical illustrations and explains why this mechanism would have significant implications for Software Engineering coordination research. We discuss issues in marshaling clear positive evidence, arguing that these issues are responsible, in part, for the under-consideration of this mechanism in software engineering and outlining research strategies which may overcome these issues.

}, keywords = {Coordination, FLOSS, Stigmergy}, attachments = {https://crowston.syr.edu./sites/crowston.syr.edu/files/stigmergy-short.pdf}, author = {Bolici, Francesco and James Howison and Kevin Crowston} } @conference {Bolici:2009, title = {Coordination without discussion? Socio-technical congruence and Stigmergy in Free and Open Source Software projects}, booktitle = {2nd International Workshop on Socio-Technical Congruence, ICSE}, year = {2009}, month = {19 May}, address = {Vancouver, Canada}, keywords = {Coordination, FLOSS}, url = {http://docs.google.com/View?id=dhncd3jd_405fzt842gv}, attachments = {https://crowston.syr.edu./sites/crowston.syr.edu/files/Coordination\%20without\%20discussion\%3F\%20Socio-technical\%20congruence.pdf}, author = {Bolici, Francesco and James Howison and Kevin Crowston} }