Toward Semantically Founded Programming Environments

现有的程序开发工具是基于一种感知的需求，即支持传统语言的编程--这些语言通常偏向于批量翻译。然而，只要放松对传统语言的强调，集成开发环境可能会隐藏传统编程语言的许多特性。基于语义的编程环境强调计算的语义方面和计算(程序)的描述。基于语义的环境提供了对语义上感兴趣的对象和结构的直接操纵，而不需要用户操纵基于语法的表示。环境被组织为交互组件的集合。每个组件都将语言或程序的一个明确定义的方面与适当的用户界面和编辑模型打包在一起。这种方法利用了环境刺激或隐藏程序文本表示中存在的许多特性的能力。本课程为期两年，研究基于语义的开发环境的基本原理和技术。这项研究有望在环境体系结构、程序开发范型、语义描述方法和使用逻辑支持编程等领域带来新的进展。

Existing tools for program development are based on a perceived requirement to support programming in conventional languages - languages often biased toward batch translation. Yet integrated development environments can hide many of the idiosyncrasies of conventional programming languages, provided only that the emphasis on conventional languages is relaxed. Semantically founded programming environments emphasize the semantic aspects of computations and descriptions of computations (programs). A semantically founded environment provides for direct manipulation of semantically interesting objects and structures without requiring a user to manipulate a syntax-based representation. The environment is organized as a collection of interacting components. Each component packages a well-defined aspect of a language or program with appropriate user-interfaces and editing models. This approach capitalizes on an environment's ability to stimulate or hide many idiosyncrasies present in textual representations of programs. This program is a two year investigation of the principles and technologies underlying semantically founded development environments. The research is expected to bring new advances in the fields of environment architecture, program development paradigms, semantic description methods, and the use of logic to support programming.