Review Depth Metric

Definition

The Review Depth Metric measures the total number of comments provided by a reviewer on a specific pull request (PR). This includes general comments, suggestions, or requests for changes.

• The Review Depth Metric is only calculated for pull requests (PRs) that have been merged.
• Comments included in the metric are those explicitly provided by the reviewer during the review process.

Why is This Metric Useful?

• This metric is crucial as it highlights the thoroughness of code reviews, which directly influences code quality. It offers insights into the level of collaboration among team members.
• By tracking the involvement of a reviewer across multiple review cycles, this metric effectively demonstrates the depth and detail of the feedback provided. This comprehensive view helps ensure that code reviews are both thorough and constructive, leading to more robust and reliable software development outcome.

How to Use it?

• Monitor review activity to ensure a balance between thoroughness and efficiency.

Examples for Context

• Increasing Review Depth results in fewer post-deployment bugs.

Calculation

• Total number of review-related actions (comments, suggestions, changes requested) in a merged PR.
  Example: A reviewer provided multiple reviews on a single pull request (PR). During the first review, they left 3 comments, followed by 2 comments in the second review, and 1 comment in the third. The Review Depth for this PR is calculated as the total number of comments made across all reviews, which is 6.
  Now, consider the same reviewer conducted a review on a different PR that was merged, leaving just 1 comment. To calculate the total Review Depth for the reviewer across these two PRs, we take the average of the total comments per PR: