Understanding Codebase like a Professional! Human–AI Collaboration for Code Comprehension
Abstract
Understanding an unfamiliar codebase is an essential task for developers in various scenarios, such as during the onboarding process. Especially when the codebase is large and time is limited, achieving a decent level of comprehension remains challenging for both experienced and novice developers, even with the assistance of large language models (LLMs). Existing studies have shown that LLMs often fail to support users in understanding code structures or to provide user-centered, adaptive, and dynamic assistance in real-world settings.
Fields of Study & Subjects
Software Engineering Research
Data Visualization and Analytics
Scientific Computing and Data Management
Publication details
- Journal / source
- Proceedings of the 2026 34th IEEE/ACM International Conference on Program Comprehension
- Publisher
- ACM
- Pages
- 343–354
- Publication date
- 12 April 2026
- Language
- EN