Subtext: uncovering the simplicity of programming

Representing programs as text strings makes programming harder then it has to be. The source text of a program is far removed from its behavior. Bridging this conceptual gulf is what makes programming so inhumanly difficult – we are not compilers. Subtext is a new medium in which the representation of a program is the same thing as its execution. Like a spreadsheet, a program is visible and alive, constantly executing even as it is edited. Program edits are coherent semantic transformations. The essence of this new medium is copying. Programs are constructed by copying and executed by copy flow: the projection of changes through copies. The simple idea of copying develops into a rich theory of higher-order continual copying of trees. Notably absent are symbolic names, the workhorse of textual notation, replaced by immediately-bound explicit relationships. Subtext unifies traditionally distinct programming tools and concepts, and enables some novel ones. Ancestral structures are a ne...

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2005
• Where: OOPSLA
• Authors: Jonathan Edwards
• Keywords: Coherent Semantic Transformations, OOPSLA 2005, Program Edits, Subtext