An Industry Case Study on Adoption of AI-based Programming Assistants

Abstract

Programming assistants based on artificial intelligence (AI), such as ChatGPT and GitHub Copilot, have gained worldwide popularity recently. Studies in software development have explored the adoption of these tools, investigating their characteristics and impacts and how practitioners interact and perceive them. To contribute to this growing body of knowledge, in this study, we aim to explore the adoption of AI-based programming assistants in the Brazilian industry. More specifically, we aim to understand how practitioners of a particular Brazilian agroindustry-related company perceive and use AI-based tools to develop software. Using an online survey, we collected and analyzed 72 responses from employees of the studied company. Our findings suggest that practitioners mainly adopt ChatGPT and GitHub Copilot, interacting with these tools to accelerate online searching, typing, and syntax recall. A recurrent difficulty is the lack of context in the suggestions provided by these tools, but participants work on detailed descriptions to contextualize and cope with this challenge. Among the reasons for not using AI-based tools, the most influential is that participants use a commercial programming language, i.e., Uniface, which these tools lack examples. Our results provide insights into the state of the practice related to AI-based programming assistants and discuss implications for practitioners and researchers.