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Repository Analytics

Repository analytics helps instructors and graders audit individual student contributions on group assignments by collecting and displaying GitHub activity including commits, pull requests, issues, and comments.

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Enabling Repository Analytics

To enable repository analytics for an assignment:
  1. Navigate to the assignment settings when creating or editing an assignment
  2. Check the “Enable repository analytics” option
  3. Save the assignment
Once enabled, analytics will be automatically collected daily for all repositories associated with the assignment.

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Viewing Repository Analytics

When repository analytics is enabled, a “Repo Analytics” button appears in the submission sidebar for instructors and graders. The analytics dashboard provides two main views:

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Items View

The Items view displays a detailed table of all repository activity:
  • Type badges: Commit, Pull Request, Issue, Issue Comment, PR Review Comment
  • Title/Message: Commit messages, PR/issue titles with links to GitHub
  • Author: GitHub username (mapped to student names when available)
  • Date: Activity date
  • State: Open/closed status for PRs and issues
  • File changes: For commits and PRs, shows files modified with additions/deletions
Contributions by User table shows aggregate counts per contributor:
  • Commits
  • Pull requests
  • Issues
  • Issue comments
  • PR review comments

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Activity Chart

The Activity Chart provides a daily visualization of repository activity over time, showing:
  • Commits
  • PRs opened
  • Issues opened and closed
  • Issue comments
  • PR review comments

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Refreshing Analytics Data

Analytics data is automatically refreshed daily at 2:00 AM UTC for active assignments. You can also manually refresh data:
  1. Click the “Refresh” button in the analytics dashboard
  2. Rate limit: Manual refreshes are limited to once per 10 minutes per repository
  3. The fetch status indicator shows when data was last updated

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Exporting Analytics Data

Click the “Export CSV” button to download all analytics data for external analysis. The CSV includes:
  • Activity type
  • GitHub ID
  • Title/message
  • Author
  • Date
  • State
  • File changes summary
  • Labels (for issues)
  • Body preview
  • GitHub URL

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Linking Rubric Checks to Analytics

Rubric checks can be linked to specific repository analytics KPIs (Key Performance Indicators). When configuring a rubric check, you can assign a KPI category:
  • commits: Track commit activity
  • prs_opened: Track pull requests created
  • pr_review_comments: Track code review participation
  • issues_opened: Track issues created
  • issues_closed: Track issue resolution
  • issue_comments: Track issue discussion participation
When a check has a KPI category assigned, graders see a “View analytics” link that filters the repository analytics to show only that activity type.

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How It Works

Repository analytics uses the GitHub API to fetch activity data:
  1. Data Collection: The system fetches issues, pull requests, commits, and comments from the assignment repository
  2. Incremental Updates: After the initial fetch, subsequent updates only retrieve new activity since the last fetch
  3. Daily Aggregation: Activity is aggregated by day for the activity chart
  4. Per-Submission View: Each submission shows analytics for its associated repository

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Rate Limiting

To respect GitHub API rate limits:
  • Manual refreshes are limited to once per 10 minutes per repository
  • Automatic daily refreshes are staggered across the 2:00 AM UTC hour
  • The system monitors GitHub rate limits and delays processing when necessary
  • Bulk operations process repositories in batches of 20

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Privacy and Access

  • Repository analytics are only visible to instructors and graders
  • Students cannot view repository analytics
  • Analytics data is scoped to the assignment’s repository
  • All data is fetched using the course’s configured GitHub organization