ase-reproducibility

Development

Use when building the open-science and reproducibility story for an ASE (IEEE/ACM Automated Software Engineering) submission, covering the mandatory Data Availability Statement, anonymized-but-runnable tools, tool and subject-system provenance pinning, cached LLM outputs, and staging for the ACM Available/Reusable artifact badges.

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Source SKILL.md: https://github.com/brycewang-stanford/Awesome-Journal-Skills/blob/HEAD/ASE-Skills/skills/ase-reproducibility/SKILL.md

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ASE Reproducibility

Build the reproducibility story at data-collection time, not at submission. ASE requires a mandatory Data Availability Statement in the paper and expects an anonymized, runnable artifact at review time; automated-SE artifacts are usually tools, so "runnable" means a reviewer can actually execute the automation on stated subjects. What is not pinned when you collect it cannot be reconstructed later.

The mandatory Data Availability Statement

Required, placed after the Conclusions and inside the 10-page limit (it is not free appendix space).
State what exists — the tool, the dataset, the subject systems, the scripts, the logs — and where it will live after acceptance (an archival DOI target).
Provide an anonymized link or upload now; "available upon request" reads as a scored weakness, not a neutral placeholder.
Match the statement to what the archive actually contains — an overclaiming statement is worse than a modest, honest one.

Anonymized-but-runnable tools

Re-host the tool and dataset behind an anonymizing service; strip repository owner, commit author metadata, and any path revealing your identity (/home/<you>/, institutional URLs).
Include a minimal run path: exact commands, expected inputs, and a small sample so a reviewer can execute the automation without your machine.
Pin the environment: dependencies with versions, a container or lockfile, and the exact tool commit — automated-SE tools rot fast against moving toolchains.

Provenance pinning (do this at collection time)

For the tool:

Exact commit SHA, build instructions, dependency versions, and configuration/flags used in the experiments (including seeds for randomized components).

For subject systems and datasets:

Names, versions, and SHAs of every subject; the corpus extraction date; query/filter criteria; and any manual labeling protocol with inter-rater agreement.
A regeneration script and a versioned snapshot — live scraping re-samples a moving target.

For LLM-based components:

Model identifiers and dates, prompts, decoding settings, and cached raw outputs so the artifact reproduces rather than calls a live, drifting API.

Reproducibility failure modes (ASE-specific)

Failure	Consequence	Prevention
Tool needs your exact machine	Reviewers cannot run it; artifact fails	Container/lockfile + minimal run path
Subjects unpinned (branch, not SHA)	Numbers cannot be reproduced	Record SHAs + extraction date at collection
LLM outputs uncached	Re-runs drift; comparison invalid	Cache outputs; record model IDs/dates
Data Availability outside the 10 pages	Policy violation	Place it after Conclusions, inside the budget
Identity leak in artifact	Anonymity violation	Scrub owner/metadata; re-host anonymized

From submission to the ACM badges

The submission-time artifact and the post-acceptance badge artifact are the same package matured. ASE offers Artifacts Available and Artifacts Reusable badges (ACM scheme); staging for them now avoids a scramble later (see ase-artifact-evaluation):

Available — deposit in a DOI-issuing archive (Zenodo / figshare / Software Heritage) with an open license.
Reusable — documentation, a clear run path, and structure that lets a stranger reuse the tool beyond reproducing your tables.

Output format

[Data Availability] present, after Conclusions, inside 10pp? matches the archive?
[Tool] commit pinned, deps versioned, container/lockfile, minimal run path?
[Subjects/data] SHAs + extraction date + selection/labeling protocol recorded?
[LLM] model IDs/dates, prompts, cached outputs?
[Anonymity] owner/metadata scrubbed; anonymized re-host?
[Badge readiness] Available (DOI+license) / Reusable (docs+run path) staged?