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Adds a research paper section to the error message composition guidelines.

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Guillaume Marceau 2011-07-06 08:48:26 -04:00
parent c287519cc0
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collects/teachpack/error-composition.scrbl
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@ -6,7 +6,7 @@
@title[#:tag "error-guidelines"]{Error Message Composition Guidelines for *SL} @title[#:tag "error-guidelines"]{Error Message Composition Guidelines for *SL}
These guidelines distill our current thoughts on writing good error messages for These guidelines distill our current thoughts on writing good error messages for
novices, as informed by our research. Please apply these to all code you write novices, as informed by @seclink["research"]{our research}. Please apply these to all code you write
that's intended for beginners, including libraries and Teachpacks. It will that's intended for beginners, including libraries and Teachpacks. It will
ensure your error messages harmonizes with those of the teaching languages. ensure your error messages harmonizes with those of the teaching languages.
@ -37,7 +37,7 @@ friendly nor antagonistic.}
@item{If an expression contains multiple errors, report the leftmost error first: @item{If an expression contains multiple errors, report the leftmost error first:
e.g., the error in (define 1 2 3) is @emph{``expected the variable name, but found a e.g., the error in (define 1 2 3) is @emph{``expected the variable name, but found a
number''}, not @emph{``expected 2 parts after define, but found 3''}. Before raising an number''}, not @emph{``expected 2 parts after define, but found 3''}. Before raising an
error about a sub-part, call @racket[local-syntax-expand] on all sub-expressions to error about a sub-part, call @racket[syntax-local-expand-expression] on all sub-expressions to
the left to trigger their errors.} the left to trigger their errors.}
@item{State the number of parts instead of saying ``found too many parts.'' Write the @item{State the number of parts instead of saying ``found too many parts.'' Write the
@ -143,3 +143,27 @@ special case of expression. Prefer ``the function call returns'', instead of
``it evaluates to'', except when trying to draw attention to you evaluation of ``it evaluates to'', except when trying to draw attention to you evaluation of
the arguments.}] the arguments.}]
@section[#:tag "research"]{Supporting Research}
These guidelines arose from the collections of research studies held at
Worcester Polytechnic Institute, Brown University, and Northeastern
University. People who are interested in learning the details of our
experiments, our results should read the following two papers.
@itemize[
@item{@hyperlink["http://www.cs.brown.edu/~sk/Publications/Papers/Published/mfk-mind-lang-novice-inter-error-msg/"]{Mind Your Language: On Novices’ Interactions with Error Messages}
This paper reports on a series of studies that explore beginning students’
interactions with the vocabulary and source-expression highlighting in
DrRacket. Our findings demonstrate that the error message DrRacket's old error
messages significantly failed to convey information accurately to students.}
@item{@hyperlink["http://www.cs.brown.edu/~sk/Publications/Papers/Published/mfk-measur-effect-error-msg-novice-sigcse/"]{Measuring
the Effectiveness of Error Messages Designed for Novice Programmers}
This paper presents a finegrained grading rubric for evaluating the performance
of individual error messages. We applied the rubric to a courseworth of student
work, which allowed us to characterize some ways error messages fail.}]