Displaying and Editing Source Code in Software Engineering Environments

Abstract

Source code plays a major role in most software engineering environments. The interface of choice between source code and human users is a tool that displays source code textually and possibly permits its modification. Specializing this tool for the source code’s language promises enhanced services for programmers as well as better integration with other tools. However, these two goals, user services and tool integration, present conflicting design constraints that have previously prevented specialization. A new architecture, based on a lexical representation of source code, represents a compromise that satisfies constraints on both sides. A prototype implementation demonstrates that the technology can be implemented using current graphical toolkits, can be made highly configurable using current language analysis tools, and that it can be encapsulated in a manner consistent with reuse in many software engineering contexts.