IBM Seeks Patent on Judging Programmers by Commits

theodp writes: How'd you like to be deemed unworthy of a job based upon a scan of your GitHub updates? That's what proposed in a newly-published IBM patent application for Automated Analysis of Code Developer's Profile, which proposes weeding out developer candidates for certain roles based on things like the amount of changes one typically makes with each commit, how frequently and regularly one makes commits, what hours of the day one makes commits, the percentage of commits with conflicts that one resolves, and the 'depth' of one's commit comments ('shallow', 'mid-range' or 'deep'). Big Blue explains that commit or repository interactions can be used to produce a 'conclusion report' that compares a developer to others who have profiles on the repository, which helps management 'avoid wasted time with ineffective developers.

Self referential loop of failure

[evanism]

What of the developers who are left to write this atrocity? Will they be terminated due to some management causation loop?

What if the implementation itself is crappy?

It boggles my mind!

Fizzbuzz

[coolmadsi]

To me this seems a little bit like an advanced version of the Fizzbuzz test [codinghorror.com] which was created to check that people applying for programming jobs can actually program.

I do recall reading on slashdot that some have used their commits in open source projects as part of their resume, as a demonstration of their ability - this could make it done somewhat automatically.

Ludicrous

[Jane Q. Public]

First of all, this presumes that stuff one puts on Github is serious, and not just some joke program or weekend project that was never intended to be taken seriously. It also presumes that one bothers to use Github in the first place... I prefer private repositories for most of my work.

To me, this smacks of judging someone professionally based on the Twitter posts they make in their spare time. In other words: not a valid measure, and actually a waste of everybody's time.

Re:

[Jane Q. Public]

That was supposed to say "judged professionally, based on..."

A tool for the programmers themselves?

[HWMTM]

I immediately thought of programmers being able to analyze their own coding habits, and make adjustments to help improve efficiency, accuracy, and readability. Any code review is a good code review, in my book.