research-article

Faith, hope, and love: an essay on software science's neglect of human factors

Author:

Stefan HanenbergAuthors Info & Claims

OOPSLA '10: Proceedings of the ACM international conference on Object oriented programming systems languages and applications

Pages 933 - 946

https://doi.org/10.1145/1869459.1869536

Published: 17 October 2010 Publication History

Abstract

Research in the area of programming languages has different facets -- from formal reasoning about new programming language constructs (such as type soundness proofs for new type systems) over inventions of new abstractions, up to performance measurements of virtual machines. A closer look into the underlying research methods reveals a distressing characteristic of programming language research: developers, which are the main audience for new language constructs, are hardly considered in the research process. As a consequence, it is simply not possible to state whether a new construct that requires some kind of interaction with the developer has any positive impact on the construction of software. This paper argues for appropriate research methods in programming language research that rely on studies of developers -- and argues that the introduction of corresponding empirical methods not only requires a new understanding of research but also a different view on how to teach software science to students.

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Index Terms

Faith, hope, and love: an essay on software science's neglect of human factors
1. Software and its engineering
  1. Software notations and tools
    1. General programming languages

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cover image ACM Conferences

OOPSLA '10: Proceedings of the ACM international conference on Object oriented programming systems languages and applications

October 2010

984 pages

ISBN:9781450302036

DOI:10.1145/1869459

General Chairs:
William R. Cook
University of Texas at Austin
,
Siobhán Clarke
Trinity College Dublin
,
Program Chairs:
Martin Rinard
MIT
,
Kevin J. Sullivan
University of Virginia
,
Daniel H. Steinberg
Dim Sum Thinking Inc.

ACM SIGPLAN Notices Volume 45, Issue 10
OOPSLA '10
October 2010
957 pages
ISSN:0362-1340
EISSN:1558-1160
DOI:10.1145/1932682
Issue’s Table of Contents

Copyright © 2010 ACM.

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Published: 17 October 2010

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Hatziapostolou TDranidis DSotiriadou AKefalas PNikolakopoulos IPolycarpou IRead JAndreou PArmoni M(2018)An authentic student research experience: fostering research skills and boosting the employability profile of studentsProceedings of the 23rd Annual ACM Conference on Innovation and Technology in Computer Science Education10.1145/3197091.3197131(254-259)Online publication date: 2-Jul-2018
Ingibergsson JHanenberg SSunshine JSchultz UHaddad HWainwright RChbeir R(2018)Experience reportProceedings of the 33rd Annual ACM Symposium on Applied Computing10.1145/3167132.3167436(2030-2033)Online publication date: 9-Apr-2018
Chamberlain RTorlak EStorm TBiddle R(2017)Assessing user preferences in programming language designProceedings of the 2017 ACM SIGPLAN International Symposium on New Ideas, New Paradigms, and Reflections on Programming and Software10.1145/3133850.3133851(18-29)Online publication date: 25-Oct-2017
Hollmann NHanenberg S(2017)An Empirical Study on the Readability of Regular Expressions: Textual Versus Graphical2017 IEEE Working Conference on Software Visualization (VISSOFT)10.1109/VISSOFT.2017.27(74-84)Online publication date: Sep-2017
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Marter TBabucke PLembken PHanenberg SVisser EMurphy-Hill ELopes C(2016)Lightweight programming experiments without programmers and programs: an example study on the effect of similarity and number of object identifiers on the readability of source code using natural textsProceedings of the 2016 ACM International Symposium on New Ideas, New Paradigms, and Reflections on Programming and Software10.1145/2986012.2986020(1-14)Online publication date: 20-Oct-2016
Uesbeck PStefik AHanenberg SPedersen JDaleiden PDillon LVisser WWilliams L(2016)An empirical study on the impact of C++ lambdas and programmer experienceProceedings of the 38th International Conference on Software Engineering10.1145/2884781.2884849(760-771)Online publication date: 14-May-2016
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