Re: Smart textual editors

Jacob Navia wrote:
> > I was looking for smart textual editors. By smart, I mean editors
> > which might be doing data flow analysis and such things even while the
> > editing is in progress so that they can point out the errors to the
> > programmer. (e.g. if certain part of the code is unreachable, then it
> > might give hints to the programmer etc.)
>
> But doing a DATA FLOW ANALYSIS in real time?
>
> First, a representation of all the globals/variables of the current
> procedure would be necessary. This information would have to be updated
> constantly, since the user is constantly modifying the program text!!!
> Syntax errors would have to be ignored, and I do not know how: what do
> you do when the user just typed a ' { ' ???
>
> Where you will put the missing closing brace?
>
> This solves the syntax error problem. As the moderator rightly pointed
> out, syntax errors MUST be accepted by the editor's parsers to let the
> user type what he wants without the editor becoming an obstacle to the
> user.


I think such a SMART editor will not come in the next ten years, because
it needs a very powerful capability: to understand what the program is
doing, not only syntax checking.


Consider the following scenario in C:


1: void function(void)
2: {
3: ....
4: { // a start of a block
5: ...
6: { // now the user types { instead of } for closing the block
7: // the two keys are very close on the keyboard ;-)
8: ....
9: }


Now the editor has to decide if there are TWO closing brackets missing
or just ONE INSTEAD of "{" on line 6. My solution is analyzing the logic
of the algorithm... at my current level of knowledge I don't know of such
a SMART EDITOR.


Regards, Mihai


P.S. every sentence should start with IMHO


Mihai Christodorescu
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                                                                                                                                  mihai@west.net
                                                            221 Estancia Place, Camarillo, CA 93012-5242, USA
                                                                                                          http://www.west.net/~mihai
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