The use of English as a programming language

Sammet, Jean Ε.

doi:10.1145/365230.365274

Cited by 65 publications

(18 citation statements)

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“…We are aware that this is a relatively old theme that can be traced to the 1960's [55]. A lot has happened in Linguistics and in Programming Languages since then.…”

Section: Contributionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Beyond AOP

Lopes

Lorenz

Lieberherr

2003

Companion of the 18th Annual ACM SIGPLAN Conference on Object-Oriented Programming, Systems, Languages, and Applications

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Software understanding for documentation, maintenance or evolution is one of the longest-standing problems in Computer Science. The use of "high-level" programming paradigms and object-oriented languages helps, but fundamentally remains far from solving the problem. Most programming languages and systems have fallen prey to the assumption that they are supposed to capture idealized models of computation inspired by deceptively simple metaphors such as objects and mathematical functions. Aspectoriented programming languages have made a significant breakthrough by noticing that, in many situations, humans think and describe in crosscutting terms. In this paper we suggest that the next breakthrough would require looking even closer to the way humans have been thinking and describing complex systems for thousand of years using natural languages. While natural languages themselves are not appropriate for programming, they contain a number of elements that make descriptions concise, effective and understandable. In particular, natural languages referentiality is a key factor in supporting powerful program organizations that can be easier understood by humans.

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“…We are aware that this is a relatively old theme that can be traced to the 1960's [55]. A lot has happened in Linguistics and in Programming Languages since then.…”

Section: Contributionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Beyond AOP

Lopes

Lorenz

Lieberherr

2003

Companion of the 18th Annual ACM SIGPLAN Conference on Object-Oriented Programming, Systems, Languages, and Applications

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“…The matter continues to be controversial. Though space prohibits a discussion of the major attitudes that have been expressed, some of the materials we have found enlightening and can recommend to the interested reader are [47,49,52,[57][58][59]66]. …”

Section: Attitudes On Computermentioning

confidence: 99%

LDC-1

Ballard

Lusth

Tinkham

1984

ACM Trans. Inf. Syst.

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During the 1970s, a number of systems providing limited English-language processing capabilities were developed to permit computer access by casual or untrained users. Our interest is in adapting and extending techniques developed for these systems, especially those used in database query systems and our own English-language programming language system (NLC), for use in office environments. This paper describes the Layered Domain Class system (LDC), a state-of-the-art natural language processor whose major goals are (1) to provide English-language retrieval capabilities for mediumsized office domains that have been stored on the computer as text-edited files, as opposed to more restrictive database structures; and (2) to eliminate the need to call in the system designer when extensions into new domains are desired, without sacrificing the depth or reliability of the interface. In this paper we (a) provide an overview of LDC, including sample inputs; (b) briefly discuss the role of each module of the system, with special attention to provisions for users to adapt the system to deal with new types of data; and (c) consider the relation of our system to other formal and natural language interfaces that are in use or under development.

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“…As in the case of natural-language interfaces, naturallanguage programming has both proponents (Biermann and Ballard 1980, Halpern 1966, Sammet 1966) and critics (Dijkstra 1963(Dijkstra , 1964.…”

Section: Natural-language Programmingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Cognitive factors in human interaction with computers

Allen¹

1982

Behaviour & Information Technology

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Designing computer interfaces to match human cognitive processes is increasingly important as computer systems become more sophisticated. This paper examines experimental results, models and research strategies relevant to cognitive processes in user interfaces for topics including query languages, command languages, programming, problem solving, editing and displays. IntroductionThe study of human factors has been, intertwined with computing science for many years; however, recently new areas of research on human-computer interaction have begun to emerge. These new fields are related to human cognitive activities such as language, problem solving, memory and attention. Indeed many recent studies on the human factors of computing systems have included dependent variables traditionally associated with cognitive psychology such as human response time, the nature of errors, the time to learn and self-reports. Moreover, many of the findings and hypotheses from human-interface research are explained in terns of cognitive theories and principles.Among the topics with cognitive implications that have been studied extensively are programming techniques, command languages, data-base access and editing. There is a cognitive component even in simple keying tasks (Conrad 1966, Zeigler andSheridan 1965). However, cognitive factors are probably more important for complex tasks, and increasingly software is being applied to these.

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The use of English as a programming language

Cited by 65 publications

References 0 publications

Beyond AOP

Beyond AOP

LDC-1

Cognitive factors in human interaction with computers

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