Automating Code Quality Feedback in an Introductory Undergraduate Computer Science Course

Writing high-quality code is one of the most important skills for programmers, affecting how easy a codebase is to work with, both for the original creator and any future editors. Since it is so important, many undergraduate programs will begin teaching code quality, sometimes referred to as style, in their introductory computer science courses. However, grading code quality by hand is a long and intensive process that takes away valuable teaching assistant time that could be spent directly working with students. We explore an approach to automating this process by creating a code quality checker program specifically designed for beginners, to be used on code written by students in a first-year undergraduate computer science course. In designing this program, we hope to give speedy, detailed, and specific feedback on student's code; so, they can practice writing good code in real time and internalize the rules of code quality.