Toward a Method for Reviewing Software Artifacts from Practice

Solving real-world problems with innovative and novel artifacts is at the core of design science research (DSR). Given DSR’s emphasis on a strong connection to the real-world, artifacts for solving a particular problem may not only be described in extant literature, but also exist in practice. This is particularly the case for software artifacts. Therefore, DSR scholars need to explore the state of the art and demonstrate the novelty of their software artifact relative to existing artifacts in research and practice. However, while methodological guidance for conducting literature reviews is abundant, there is little guidance on how to review software artifacts from practice. This paper takes a first step toward addressing this gap by proposing and illustrating a seven-step method for reviewing software artifacts from practice. Our research provides actionable guidance for DSR scholars on how to support the claim that their software artifact constitutes a substantial contribution to knowledge.