activity-dates-and-times.md

Activity Dates and Times

Question: What are the dates and timestamps of when contributor activities occur?

Overview

This metric focuses on identifying the dates and times when individuals contribute to open-source projects. Analyzing timestamps of contributions can help infer activity patterns and even estimate contributors' geographic regions, especially when direct time zone data is unavailable (e.g., contributions in non-UTC). This information can offer transparency for employers about employee contributions and provide open-source project managers with insights into global engagement and when contributors are most active.

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Data Collection Strategies

• Timestamps from activities such as commits, issues, pull requests, and mailing list messages should be captured.
• Aggregation of data by UTC or contributors' local time can reveal activity patterns globally.
• Collaboration tools like GitHub, GitLab, and email platforms can provide timestamped activity data.

Filters

• By Organization: Contributions can be filtered to focus on specific individuals affiliated with organizations.
• Aggregation by UTC Time: Shows global contributions and identifies project active periods.
• Aggregation by Local Time: Helps track when contributors contribute during their working hours or off-hours.
• Repository ID: Filters data by specific repositories or subprojects.
• Community Segmentation: Contributions can be segmented by regions or time zones, such as EU or US activities, to visualize community participation.

Visualizations

Figure 1: Heatmap showing contribution activity by UTC time across the globe ()

Figure 2: Chart displaying when contributors are active based on local times ()

Figure 3: Global distribution of contributor activities by time zone ()

Figure 4: Breakdown of contribution activity by repository segments ()

References

• Coordinated Universal Time (UTC): Used to standardize timestamps for analyzing contributions across different regions and tools.

Contributors

• None Specified

Additional Information

• To edit this metric please submit a Change Request here.
• To reference this metric in software or publications, please use this stable URL: https://chaoss.community/?p=3444.