Direct Manipulation Programming Systems (A Brief Introduction)

Programming languages and direct manipulation user interfaces are distinct approaches for creating digital objects that combine visual and textual elements, such as documents, graphics, web applications, games, and data visualizations. At one end of the spectrum, programming languages provide experts an array of abstraction mechanisms to generate complex output, but the reliance on text-based representations (i.e. source code) limits the pace of productivity. At the other end, direct manipulation interfaces cater to a wide range of users with intuitive and interactive graphical tools, but the lack of abstraction capabilities results in tedious, repetitive work and, worse, limits users to features that are provided. We propose a vision for direct manipulation programming systems that augment general-purpose, text-based programming languages with powerful new direct manipulation capabilities, a goal closely related to live programming (McDirmid 2013). As a €rst step, we are developing Sketch-n-Sketch, an IDE for creating programs that compute Scalable Vector Graphics output. Sketch-n-Sketch is a direct manipulation programming system equipped with (1) new direct manipulation techniques for manipulating the output of a program, and (2) new direct manipulation techniques for manipulating the source code of a program. Our goal can be summarized with the moŠo: “Programming with Less Keyboard, More Mouse.”