Interacting with Code
Through different mediums
When we interact with a codebase, by default, it’s through a text editor. We dig through directories to find the file containing the code we want to see. Then, we might dig through a different set of directories to find a different file with related code we want to see at the same time.
More directly, we might be interested in seeing the implementation, test cases, and documentation for a specific part of some app.
Both describe the same goal.
In human-computer interaction, there’s a concept called the gulfs of evaluation and execution. It describes the overhead users incur when they translate intent into implementation using the tools they have at hand.
I’ve always been interested in reducing that overhead for software development.
I’ve seen a lot of examples.
Code editors often embed contextual information aside file contents:
Live, interactive, code examples put code and execution results side-by-side:
I recently came across an example of co-locating implementation, test cases, and documentation:
And then, there’s programming by example:
I don’t have much to say on this at the moment. I’ll just be letting these ideas marinate for a while.
