Programming with keywords
Name
191913384-MIT.pdf
Description
Full printable version
Size
7.72 MB
Format
Adobe PDF
Checksum (MD5)
eee60b5242ce192c3eb3643b0fb6f6f7
Author(s)
Little, Greg (Danny Greg)
Advisor(s)
Robert C. Miller.
Date Issued
2007
Publisher
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Abstract
Modern applications provide interfaces for scripting, but many users do not know how to write script commands. However, many users are familiar with the idea of entering keywords into a web search engine. Hence, if a user is familiar with the vocabulary of an application domain, they may be able to write a set of keywords expressing a command in that domain. For instance, in the web browsing domain, a user might enter the keywords click search button. This thesis presents several algorithms for translating keyword queries such as this directly into code. A prototype of this system in the web browsing domain translates click search button into the code click(findButton("search")). This code may then be executed in the context of a web browser to carry out the effect. Another prototype in the Java domain translates append message to log into log.append(message), given an appropriate context of local variables and imported classes. The algorithms and prototypes are evaluated with several studies, suggesting that users can write keyword queries with little or no instructions, and that the resulting translations are often accurate. This is especially true in small domains like the web, whereas in a large domain like Java, the accuracy is comparable to the accuracy of writing syntactically correct Java code without assistance.
Description
Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, 2007.
Includes bibliographical references (p. 105-108).
Subjects
Electrical Engineering and Computer Science.
MIT Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
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