Forms/3: A first-order visual language to explore the boundaries of the spreadsheet paradigm

End-user programming is a term that refers to computer programming carried out by end users who do not necessarily have a background in writing programs in conventional programming languages. There is much interest amongst end-users to be able to write their own programs. In order to support end-user programming, the concept of Block Based Software Development has been introduced. In this environment, end-users can develop applications by selecting, customizing and combining software blocks. A block is basically a single-layer software component that can perform a specific function. It is assumed that in this environment, there will be a large number of blocks available to be used by the end-users. Block Integration Tool is an Integrated Development Environment (IDE) that can be used by end-users to develop applications. By using this tool, end-users can select a block and then drag it into the work area. Customization can be done bychanging some properties of the block such as colour, text, audio and video content. This block can then be combined with the existing blocks in the work area. Once the process of selecting and combining blocks is completed, an application can then be generated. Implementations are carried out using Netbeans version 6.9. The evaluation of the tool will be carried out to ensure that it is suitable to be used by end users.

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“…i (1)(2)(3)(4)(5)(6)(7)(8)(9) v. Number range in tens (10-90) vi. Number range in hundreds (100-900) …”

Section: B Selecting Blocksmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…One of the applications that have been widely used by end-users is Forms/3. This application uses spreadsheet approach that requires user to input value in the cells provided [6]. Another example is Programming by Demonstration [5] in which end-users develop applications based on suitable examples provided by the system.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The design of blocks integration tool to support end-user programming

Sarif

Idris

Zin

2011

Proceedings of the 2011 International Conference on Electrical Engineering and Informatics

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“…Some researchers have exploited the standard spreadsheet's tabular structure and built-in operations for duplicating calculations, in order to let users build and manipulate processing flows side by side [4,7]. By contrast, projects such as Forms/3 [3] have shown a variety of powerful ways in which the spreadsheet model can be extended.…”

Section: Related Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

RecipeSheet

Lunzer

Hornbæk

2006

Proceedings of the 19th Annual ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology

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Many tasks require users to extract information from diverse sources, to edit or process this information locally, and to explore how the end results are affected by changes in the information or in its processing. We present the Re-cipeSheet, a general-purpose tool for assisting users in such tasks. The RecipeSheet lets users create information processors, called recipes, which may take input in a variety of forms such as text, Web pages, or XML, and produce results in a similar variety of forms. The processing carried out by a recipe may be specified using a macro or query language, of which we currently support Rexx, Smalltalk and XQuery, or by capturing the behaviour of a Web application or Web service. In the RecipeSheet's spreadsheetinspired user interface, information appears in cells, with inter-cell dependencies defined by recipes rather than formulas. Users can also intervene manually to control which information flows through the dependency connections. Through a series of examples we illustrate how tasks that would be challenging in existing environments are supported by the RecipeSheet.

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“…The cell-and-formula approach of C3Sheets is based on the spreadsheet model; other well known spreadsheet-based systems include Forms/3 [4], Information Visualization Spreadsheets [5], and C32 [15]. In general, such projects selectively adopt or abandon various features of what could be called the traditional spreadsheet.…”

Section: Passing Information Between Applicationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Clip, connect, clone

Fujima

Lunzer

Hornbæk

et al. 2004

Proceedings of the 17th Annual ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology

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Many applications provide a form-like interface for requesting information: the user fills in some fields, submits the form, and the application presents corresponding results. Such a procedure becomes burdensome if (1) the user must submit many different requests, for example in pursuing a trial-and-error search, (2) results from one application are to be used as inputs for another, requiring the user to transfer them by hand, or (3) the user wants to compare results, but only the results from one request can be seen at a time. We describe how users can reduce this burden by creating custom interfaces using three mechanisms: clipping of input and result elements from existing applications to form cells on a spreadsheet; connecting these cells using formulas, thus enabling result transfer between applications; and cloning cells so that multiple requests can be handled side by side. We demonstrate a prototype of these mechanisms, initially specialised for handling Web applications, and show how it lets users build new interfaces to suit their individual needs.

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Forms/3: A first-order visual language to explore the boundaries of the spreadsheet paradigm

Cited by 119 publications

References 85 publications

The design of blocks integration tool to support end-user programming

The design of blocks integration tool to support end-user programming

RecipeSheet

Clip, connect, clone

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