An Automated Assessment System for Analysis of Coding Convention Violations in Java Programming Assignments
HSI-MIN CHEN, WEI-HAN CHEN AND CHI-CHEN LEE Department of Information Engineering and Computer science Feng Chia University Taichung, 40724 Taiwan E-mail: fhmchen, d0239867, gjl840311g@mail.fcu.edu.tw
Coding conventions are a set of coding guidelines used by software developers to improve the readability of source code and increase software maintainability. Understanding coding conventions has become an indispensable discipline in software engineering; however, many university-level programming courses fail to prepare their students in this regard. In this study, we examined the distribution of coding convention violations in the assignments of programming courses where coding conventions are neglected. We then developed an automated system by which students can submit their programs and obtain immediate feedback on their coding assignments. Moreover, the system reduces the workload on instructors by providing insight into the quality of the code presented by students.