Development of a new system for programming language education

2003 Fiscal Year Final Research Report Summary

• Project/Area Number: 14380150
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (B)
• Allocation Type: Single-year Grants
• Section: 一般
• Research Field: 計算機科学
• Research Institution: Tottori University of Environmental Studies
• Principal Investigator: TOKURA Nobuki Tottori University of Environmental Studies, Faculty of Environment and Information, Professor, 環境情報学部, 教授 (10029423)
• Co-Investigator(Kenkyū-buntansha): NAGAI Takayuki Tottori University of Environmental Studies, Faculty of Environment and Information, Associate Professor, 助教授 (00341074) ; NAGATAKI Hiroyuki Tottori University of Environmental Studies, Faculty of Environment and Information, Assistant, 助手 (20351877) ; MATSUMAE Susumu Tottori University of Environmental Studies, Faculty of Environment and Information, Associate Professor, 助教授 (60324828) ; SAITOH Akinori Tottori University of Environmental Studies, Faculty of Environment and Information, Professor, 教授 (20235021) ; MASUZAWA Toshimitsu Osaka University, Graduate School of Information Science, Professor, 大学院・情報科学研究科, 教授 (50199692)
• Project Period (FY): 2002 – 2003
• Keywords: language processing system / tree-editor / pair-programming

Research Abstract

This research includes several subthemes.
(1)A new program editing system.
The system consists of several editors. A fundamental tree editor is implemented to edit tree structure data which enables to build a tree structure data, save it into a file and load from saved files. The second editor enables to make a program in tree-structured form guided by an abstract syntax of the language. The third editor is implemented to make a program in a text-form from the program in tree-structured form guided by a local rewriting rules attached to each abstract syntax rule. This editor as a study tool allows students to compare the concrete syntax between several languages and to test their own code generation rules. These tools can be used to try new language features. Although we can not yet test the system in the field and evaluate it in real usages, our early experiences of trial usage show the system could be useful in a program language class. In possible chances, we would like to use the system in one of our class.
(2)A program interpreting system
We intended to implement a system which can simulate the program build by the above-mentioned tree-editor. This system is to demonstrate the computational states visually with user-oriented focusing. We have several new ideas, but the implementation is not so easy. At present, the system is under construction.
(3)Remote programming
Our team consists of two groups at Tottori and Osaka. We have implemented a remote pair programming system based on text-base shared windows. We are testing the system in several different situations and gathering data for evaluation. [1]
Summing up, in this study, we get several ideas and prototype systems, with which we can extend our research further.
[1] H.Nagataki, E.Kitamura, T.Nagai and N.Tokura : Development of remote pair-programming system SATORI and its application to programming education. Annual Conference of JSEE,2004.7.30.