I am using the files from that site here in response to suggestions Matthew Kirschenbaum and others have made that code exists in a particularly rich environment, and that programmers encounter it in their development process.  While this process at times involves the use of IDEs such as NetBeans, which Brett Stalbaum used, it also involves the versioning system.  To read code, Kirschenbaum argued, is to read it in the context of its versioning process in connection with all of its files.   This context, he argued, would make allow for readings of code that would go beyond the highly selective use of snippets and would create a space not only for richer discussion but also for additional scholars to join the analysis, which is part of the larger project of Critical Code Studies at this point.   

To respond to this suggestion, Craig Dietrich has given the Scalar platform the ability to the code source files directly from the SVN, maintaining that link with their larger context.  As a result, new readers can follow the code not only to its context but can pursue additional files, such as the tbtdemo files, which contains versions of the software used in a previous instantiation.

Of course, these files only reflect the changes to the Transborder Immigrant Tool files since the July 23, 2010 release as opposed to the historical development of the tool.  Future Critical Code Studies can benefit from access top the development logs throughout the programming process.  

However, investigating the subversion files goes beyond a robust methodology for Critical Code Studies; instead, it marks the an attempt to demonstrate that any given file of source code is a sign of a process, both a process to be engaged by the computer and a process of development or of potential development.