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Intelligent bot Repairnator joins Eclipse

Repairnator@GitHub
Published Sep 26, 2019

Last year, the automatic bug fixing bot Repairnator fooled the Github community. Under code name ‘Luc Esape’, the bot wrote patches good enough to pass as a human user. Now Repairnator takes the next step by joining the Eclipse foundation.

Hi Martin Monperrus, Professor in Software Technology and one of the creators of Repairnator! What has happened with Repairnator during 2019?

"2019 was a very important year for Repairnator. We consolidated the code base in order to set up a good collaboration structure outside KTH. Next, we made a formal application to join the Eclipse Foundation, which is one of the top 3 open-source foundations in the world, widely known for its Eclipse Development Environement. The application was reviewed by the board of Eclipse who identified it as promising software technology. On July 3rd 2019, the application was accepted and Repairnator officially joined the foundation."

What does it mean to have the support of the Eclipse foundation?

"It means that Repairnator is ready for collaboration. Industry partners can now staff engineers to work on the project, with a clean intellectual property foundation and infrastructure, which is the expertise of Eclipse. SAAB and Ericsson, the close industry partners of CASTOR - the KTH Center for Software Technology – have expressed initial interest in contributing to the project. It is also a collaboration platform with academic partners: other universities in Sweden and Europe. To sum up, Repairnator is now an open-source, community-run project which aims at being the reference software platform for automated bug fixing."

Almost a year has gone since Luc Esape revealed himself as a bot at Github. Looking forward, what will happen with Repairnator in 2020?

"In 2020, we will be working on two fronts. First the research continues, we are inventing breakthrough features such as AlphaRepairnator which applies some ideas of Google’s AlphaGo to automated bug fixing. Second, we are working to grow the community and to welcome contributers from industry." 

About Repairnator

Repairnator at Github

Project description

For further information on Repairnator, contact Professor Martin Monperrus:

Belongs to: School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
Last changed: Sep 26, 2019