Context as an Antidote to Information Overload

Summary form only given. Software developers who perform evolution tasks on a software system face an avalanche of information daily. These developers must deal with multiple source code elements, bug reports, system test data, questions from team members, and so on. Information mined from the historical archives of a development can provide helpful cues to developers as they perform their work, but how can this historical information be delivered effectively given the already overwhelming amount of information facing developers? In this talk, I will describe how various representations of a developer's context can help manage information overload, improve team awareness and provide an anchor for interpreting historical project information.