Inproceedings,
Evaluation Issues for Visual Programming Languages
Eleventh Workshop on Knowledge Acquisition, Modeling and Management, Banff, Canada, (1998)
Abstract
Visual programming systems have several advantages: (1) they are very motivating for beginners; (2) a spatial representation simplifies certain limited kinds of inferencing; (3) the use of ill-structured diagrams may assist in brain-storming. However, these three benefits may not be widely applicable. Many software engineering and knowledge engineering problems are not inherently spatial. Also, most VP tools do not support ill-structured diagrams. Lastly, diagrams are not necessarily superior explanation tools. In many cases, studies claiming certain benefits with visual systems can be matched by a counter-study with the opposite results. Clearly, some variable is not being controlled for within these opposing studies. It is possible that the task of a system is more important than its presentation (visual or textual).
