Organizational smells are warnings presented in the Virtual Code Review to highlight potential issues.
The term 'Organizational' refers to the structure of people working on the codebase, including teams and individual contributors.
In the Global Analysis Rules Configuration, three predefined organizational warnings are:
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Developer Congestion (Organizational): A high number of developers have recently committed to this file. While it does not lower code health, it serves as an important warning. Extra care should be taken during the review.
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Complex Code By Former Contributors (Organizational): This warning highlights complex modules where most of the code was written by a former contributor, such as a developer who has left the organization. It does not lower code health but signals a risk that should be carefully reviewed.
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Knowledge Island in Complex Hotspots (Organizational): This warning flags complex modules where most of the code is written by only one contributor. It does not lower code health but indicates a potential knowledge risk.
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These metrics appear as warnings in the Virtual Code Review when the corresponding organizational smells occur. However, they are not adjustable in the Global Analysis Rules Configuration. Also, none of them impact the Code Health scores.
To proactively identify risks such as Complex Code by Former Contributors and Knowledge Islands in Complex Hotspots, the Knowledge Risks view is the appropriate analysis. This view highlights areas of the codebase that may be at risk due to past contributions from former team members or concentrated knowledge within specific sections of the code..png?width=688&height=547&name=image%20(29).png)