Abstract:
Computer Science students often don’t make use of the debugger. If they do, they only use its basic functionality. We propose encouraging students to better exploit the debuggers’ potential by providing them with debugging related gamification elements integrated into their usual IDE. Among several suitable gamification elements, we are focusing on achievements which are well-researched and work well across different contexts, including software engineering. We have developed an IntelliJ IDEA plugin that awards achievements for reaching specific milestones when using the debugger such as using the stepper for the first time or setting 100 breakpoints. We conducted an experiment with second semester Bachelors’ students in which we required them to use the plugin while working on programming tasks. Half of the participants were shown the debugger-related achievements and the other half used a non-active version of the plugin where usage data was only collected but not displayed. The results from an initial analysis of students’ self-report data look promising.
PPIG 2026 - 37th Annual Workshop
Can Gamification Encourage Debugger Usage?