Seminar: Advanced Software Engineering HS20

• 2020-09-14: This course is a mixed mode, online or in-person class attendance is expected (and required for the discussions).
• 2020-09-15: Kick-off slides can be found here (PDF, 13 MB).
• 2020-09-17: All students have been notified about their assigned paper and the (tentative) date of their presentation. If you did not receive a mail, please contact Alexander Lill
• 2020-10-21: Updated timings for presentations (as announced in email), added links to ACM template & EasyChair submission page, updated room for lectures to "online"
• 2020-11-03: Made days without classes explicit

Software requires constant evolution due to changing customer needs, bugs that have to be fixed, or changes in the environment. Lehman’s first law of software evolution states that a software system must be continuously adapted, or it becomes less and less useful. The constant change poses many challenges, and both researchers and practitioners have recognized the importance of studying and supporting software evolution and the humans involved in the process. In this seminar, we will cover some of the most relevant studies, approaches, and techniques that researchers have looked at in this context.

In this seminar, the students will work on a specific research topic in software engineering. By the end of the course, they will be asked to deliver a research proposal. Furthermore, the students will take part in a simulated peer-reviewing process for the proposals. Finally, they will share as a presentation the results of their work and discuss them with the class.

For this seminar, you will be asked to read, analyze and discuss research papers, as well as work on and write a scientific report about a proposed topic in software engineering.

content of software engineering, programming

• Presentation and moderation of a discussion topic;
• Response papers for each reading assignment (that one does not moderate) and active participation in discussion sessions;
• Written proposal, scientific report, and oral presentations and discussions for a topic in software engineering;
• Feedback on reports written by others (peer review).

At the end of this course, students should:

• Have gained a deeper and broader understanding and knowledge of Software Engineering research by reading, analyzing, reflecting and discussing current and classic literature;
• Be able to identify and discuss research problems and research questions as well as identify relevant related work;
• Be able to write a scientific report, and present and discuss ideas on an advanced topic in Software Engineering research;
• Be able to provide constructive feedback on a research proposal

1. At the beginning of the course students will be assigned a topic, paper (based on preferences) and a partner to work on this topic.
2. For each lecture / discussion session,
   • The two teams assigned to the papers/topic will present their paper, another relevant related paper they found, and moderate a discussion about the two papers / topic (the asssigned one and the one they found). The assigned teams also have to make sure to have read the other paper of the topic.
   • All other students: identify one additional paper related and relevant with respect to the topic and the given two papers; write one response paper covering the two papers listed + the one found for the topic.
3. Each team has to draft a research proposal in the area of their topic and present their draft. The draft should be a maximum of 3 pages (+ pages for references) and should have a motivation, related work section showing the relevance of the research idea/question, and a section on the research question and approach.
4. Until the end of the course, every team then refines their research proposal, writing a more complete related work section, specifying in more detail how they would go about addressing/answering the research question they pose (study method / study design), and what the motivation is. The final research proposal should be a max. 6 pages (+ pages for references). 
5. At the end of the course, the proposals are submitted and peer-reviewed by other students.
6. At the last session the proposals are presented by the respective teams and the proposals will be peer evaluated by the reviewers.