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thiennhientuoid 06-24-2016 12:24 AM

A programming language that uses a visual representation
 
A programming language that uses a visual representation
(such as graphics, drawings, animation or icons,
partially or completely)
A visual language manipulates visual information or supports visual interaction, or allows programming with visual expressions [Golin 90]
Any system where the user writes a program using two or more dimensions [Myers 90]
A visual language is a set of spatial arrangements of text-graphic symbols with a semantic interpretation that is used in carrying out communication actions in the world

VP Taxonomy by Burnett and Baker (1994)
Software paradigm, language level, application domain,
visual extent (icon, form, diagram,...)



Doesn't everyone agree that VP is great?

No. In fact, some well-respected people have nothing but contempt for the visual representation of software. In a very famous article [Brooks87] Fred Brooks says this:
A favorite subject for PhD dissertations in software engineering is graphical, or visual, programming - the application of computer graphics to software design.... Nothing even convincing, much less exciting, has yet emerged from such efforts. I am persuaded that nothing will.
Of course, Brooks' arguments contain several weaknesses:
He focuses on flowchart-based control-flow diagrams.
He is worried about screen size in pixels. Phil Cox has presented a strong argument why this may not be meaningful.
I think he misunderstands the power of multiple views - not superimposed views.
What about Visual Basic and Visual C++?

Visual Basic and the entire Microsoft Visual (tm) family are not, despite their names, visual programming languages. They are textual languages which use a graphical gui builder to make programming decent interfaces easier on the programmer.





What is the Deutsch Limit?

A term made up by Fred Lakin describing a comment Peter Deutsch made at a VL talk by Scott Kim and Warren Robinett about a visual machine language they had invented.
Deutsch said something like:

"Well, this is all fine and well, but the problem with visual programming languages is that you can't have more than 50 visual primitives on the screen at the same time. How are you going to write an operating system?"
This points out the obvious density advantage of text. This barrier has become known as the "Deutsch Limit," stated as:
The problem with visual programming is that you can't have more than 50 visual primitives on the screen at the same time.
This is clearly a problem with visual representations. However, it is not immediately clear to me that a similar limit does not also exist in textual languages.


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