"Reproducibility in Software Engineering" thesis has been published

Hey all,

At the end of June, I successfully presented my master thesis "Reproducibility in Software Engineering. I just notice that I forgot to share it here, on these forums.

The thesis is now open-source and open to contributions. Since June, I published updates, and I’m planning to keep this monthly release schedule as long as I receive contributions. The idea is to keep this project alive, just like any other open-source project.

Repositories: GitHub - drupol/master-thesis: Pol Dellaiera's Master Thesis - Reproducibility In Software Engineering or p1ld7a/master-thesis: Pol Dellaiera's Master Thesis - Reproducibility In Software Engineering - Codeberg.org

The concept of reproducibility has long been a cornerstone in scientific research, ensuring that results are robust, repeatable, and can be independently verified. This concept has been extended to computer science, focusing on the ability to recreate identical software artefacts. However, the importance of reproducibility in software engineering is often overlooked, leading to challenges in the validation, security, and reliability of software products.

This master’s thesis aims to investigate the current state of reproducibility in software engineering, exploring both the barriers and potential solutions to making software more reproducible and raising awareness. It identifies key factors that impede reproducibility such as inconsistent environments, lack of standardisation, and incomplete documentation. To tackle these issues, I propose an empirical comparison of tools facilitating software reproducibility.

To provide a comprehensive assessment of reproducibility in software engineering, this study adopts a methodology that involves a hands-on evaluation of four different methods and tools. Through a systematic evaluation of these tools, this research seeks to determine their effectiveness in establishing and maintaining identical software environments and builds.

This study contributes to academic knowledge and offers practical insights that could influence future software development protocols and standards.

Please feel free to give me your feedback/opinion, remember to remain courteous and polite.

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Wow, it really looks pretty! :+1: And a build process for the PDF, that’s how it should be done! :clap::clap:

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I just read your thesis - very nice!

It will be helpful for the section that I’m writing on what to consider when picking tools for reproducible computation for The Turing Way see: [WIP] Considerations for choosing and limitations of reproducible environment tools by RichardJActon · Pull Request #3741 · the-turing-way/the-turing-way · GitHub for current progress. I’m planning on picking it up again in November at their next ‘book-dash’ a hackathon-like event for contributing to the book and would welcome input from some of the knowledgeable people in this community.

Glad to hear! Thanks.

The Turing Way is a really great resources. I really like the PR you’re introducing, can’t wait to see your future changes.

The way this is produced is how I always thought academic writing should work. Looking forward to find time to finally read this in full!

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