Distributed software development poses many challenges. One of the main factors is the complexity of technical dependencies existing in the code base, which leads to complex social-technical dependencies among developers. This social-technical complexity inevitably leads to software conflicts because of coordination problems. Recently, we have been witnessing the development of new kinds of collaborative technology, and variations on existing technologies that support new collaborative development practices. New trends in organization of distributed, collaborative work and the development of new technologies supporting it result in an intriguing interplay of people and technology, which motivates my research in supporting coordination in software development. In this talk, I will discuss coordination tools developed by my group to facilitate distributed software development. In particular I will focus on tools that help in exploring software dependencies and scheduling tasks to minimize conflicts.

Anita Sarma is an Assistant Professor at the Department of Computer Science and Engineering at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln. Previously, she was a post doctoral fellow at the School of Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon University. She holds a Ph.D. degree in Information and Computer Science from the University of California, Irvine. Her research interests are at the intersection of software engineering and computer-supported cooperative work. She seeks to understand how factors such as interdependencies among work artifacts, design erosion of the work product, and organizational culture affect coordination; and create effective coordination solutions for distributed development by identifying the kinds of information required for coordination, the means of generating and distributing such information, and ways to present it. Anita regular serves on program committees in Software Engineering conferences (ICSE, ASE, ICGSE), has been the co-chair of ICSE 2014 formal demonstration track and serves as a reviewer for TSE, TOSEM, TOCHI.