Choice Matters: Contrasting Package Manager User Experience
A package manager (PM) is crucial to most technology stacks, acting as a broker to ensure that a verified dependency package is correctly installed, configured, or removed from an application. Diversity in technology stacks has led to dozens of PMs with various features. While recent studies have shown that developers struggle to migrate their dependencies, the common assumption is that PMs are used without any issue. In this study, we explore sixteen PMs to understand whether their features correlate with the experience of their users. By studying experience through the questions that developers ask on the question-and-answer site Stack Overflow, we find that developer questions are grouped into three themes (i.e., PM management, Input-Output, and Package Usage). Our analysis results indicate that specific features are correlated with the user experience. Our work lays out future directions to investigate the trade-offs involved in designing the ideal PM.
Sat 29 MayDisplayed time zone: Amsterdam, Berlin, Bern, Rome, Stockholm, Vienna change
14:40 - 15:55 | First SessionSoHeal 2021 at SoHeal Room Chair(s): Ahmed Zerouali Vrije Universiteit Brussel Presentations will be pre-recorded (15mn). Pitches and Q&A will be organized at the end of the session, in sequence for each presentation
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14:40 15mTalk | Choice Matters: Contrasting Package Manager User Experience SoHeal 2021 Raula Gaikovina Kula NAIST, Syful Islam Nara Institute of Science and Technology, Bodin Chinthanet Nara Institute of Science and Technology, Christoph Treude University of Adelaide, Takashi Ishio Nara Institute of Science and Technology, Kenichi Matsumoto Nara Institute of Science and Technology Media Attached | ||
14:55 15mResearch paper | A Quantitative Assessment of Package Freshness in Linux Distributions SoHeal 2021 Pre-print Media Attached | ||
15:10 15mResearch paper | Does the duration of rapid release cycles affect the bug handling activity? SoHeal 2021 Thorn Jansen Eindhoven University of Technology, Zeinab Abou Khalil University of Mons and University of Lille, Eleni Constantinou Eindhoven University of Technology, Tom Mens University of Mons Pre-print Media Attached | ||
15:25 30mLive Q&A | Pitches and Discussion SoHeal 2021 Media Attached |
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