Structured flowcharts outperform pseudocode: an experimental comparison

Scanlan, David A.

doi:10.1109/52.35587

Cited by 125 publications

(63 citation statements)

References 7 publications

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“…Authors concluded that there is no difference between both. Years later, Scalan [23] highlights some experimental flaws of the original experiment (not taking time into account, questions that could only be answered from the pseudocode and too simple program). Scalan proved that flowcharts outperform pseudocode with a proper experimental design.…”

Section: Some Epistemological Results Of the Empirical Research Appromentioning

confidence: 99%

Epistemological and Ontological Representation in Software Engineering

Cuadrado-Gallego

Rodríguez

Garre

et al. 2007

Computational Science – ICCS 2007

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Abstract. This paper provides an overview of how empirical research can be a valid approach to improve epistemological foundations and ontological representations in Software Engineering (SE). Despite of all the research done in SE, most of the results have not been yet been stated as laws, theories, hypothesis or conjectures, i.e., from an epistemological point of view. This paper explores such facts and advocates that the use of empirical methods can help to improve this situation. Furthermore, it is also imperative for SE experiments to be planned and executed properly in order to be valid epistemologically. Finally, this paper presents some epistemological and ontological results obtained from empirical research in SE.

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Section: Some Epistemological Results Of the Empirical Research Appromentioning

confidence: 99%

Epistemological and Ontological Representation in Software Engineering

Cuadrado-Gallego

Rodríguez

Garre

et al. 2007

Computational Science – ICCS 2007

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“…Later, many studies from the field of computer science contributed to the debate. Among others, authors compared the comprehension performance of code-based representations and flow diagrams [18,19,20]. The conclusions of these and other works remain, however, contradictory.…”

Section: The Value Of Requirements Generationmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…For this purpose each system from the requirements model is analyzed separately. For each system, the algorithm then analyzes the respective operations that are associated with this system (lines [19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27]. If a considered operation is of type "use", a sentence using template D1 is created (lines 20-22).…”

Section: D2mentioning

confidence: 99%

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A semi-automated approach for generating natural language requirements documents based on business process models

Aysolmaz

Leopold

Reijers

et al. 2018

Information and Software Technology

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Context: The analysis of requirements for business-related software systems is often supported by using business process models. However, the final requirements are typically still specified in natural language.This means that the knowledge captured in process models must be consistently transferred to the specified requirements. Possible inconsistencies between process models and requirements represent a serious threat for the successful development of the software system and may require the repetition of process analysis activities.Objective: The objective of this paper is to address the problem of inconsistency between process models and natural language requirements in the context of software development. Method:We define a semi-automated approach that consists of a process model-based procedure for capturing execution-related data in requirements models and an algorithm that takes these models as input for generating natural language requirements. We evaluated our approach in the context of a multiple case study with three organizations and a total of 13 software development projects.Results: We found that our approach can successfully generate well-readable requirements, which do not only positively contribute to consistency, but also to the completeness and maintainability of requirements.The practical use of our approach to identify a suitable subcontractor on the market in 11 of the 13 projects further highlights the practical value of our approach. Conclusion:Our approach provides a structured way to obtain high-quality requirements documents from process models and to maintain textual and visual representations of requirements in a consistent way.

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“…To date, these suggest that flowcharts can outperform text for certain tasks but not for the entire programming process. Scanlan (1989) investigated the comprehensibility of structured flowcharts and textual "pseudo-code" as representations for conditional logic. He asked programming students to view conditional logic and then answer questions about the states required to trigger given actions.…”

Section: Flowchartsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Cognitive Factors in Programming with Diagrams

Blackwell

Whitley

Good

et al. 2001

Thinking With Diagrams

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Visual programming languages aim to broaden the use of diagrams within the software industry, to the extent that they are integrated into the programming language itself. As a result, they provide an ideal opportunity to study the benefits of diagrams as an external representation during problem solving: not only is programming a challenging problem-solving activity, but the effect of diagram usage can be directly assessed by comparing performance while using a visual programming language to performance with a standard textual language. There have been several misconceptions amongst visual language researchers regarding the role of diagrams in software design, but these are being addressed by empirical studies and by new theories of notation design derived from studies of visual programming. Based on this research, the authors are able to recommend several new directions for research into thinking with diagrams.

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Structured flowcharts outperform pseudocode: an experimental comparison

Cited by 125 publications

References 7 publications

Epistemological and Ontological Representation in Software Engineering

Epistemological and Ontological Representation in Software Engineering

A semi-automated approach for generating natural language requirements documents based on business process models

Cognitive Factors in Programming with Diagrams

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