Managing ambiguity in programming by finding unambiguous examples

Abstract

We propose a new way to raise the level of discourse in the programming process: permit ambiguity, but manage it by linking it to unambiguous examples. This allows programming environments to work with informal descriptions that lack precise semantics, such as natural language descriptions or conceptual diagrams, without requiring programmers to formulate their ideas in a formal language first. As an example of this idea, we present Zones, a code search and reuse interface that connects code with ambiguous natural language statements about its purpose. The backend, called ProcedureSpace, relates purpose statements, static code analysis features, and natural language background knowledge. ProcedureSpace can search for code given statements of purpose or vice versa, and can find code that was never annotated or commented. Since completed Zones searches become annotations, system coverage grows with user interaction. Users in a preliminary study found that reasoning jointly over natural language and programming language helped them reuse code.