The Mother of all Programming Languages Demos • Sean McDirmid • YOW! 2015

Programming environments need to move from discrete, archery-like interactions (aim, shoot, miss, repeat) to continuous, water hose-like feedback loops where small input changes yield immediate visual feedback

“Holy terms” allow for flexible placeholders that can be manipulated directly in the UI and automatically propagate changes throughout the code without explicit type annotations

Live programming with continuous execution enables seeing program state and behavior without setting breakpoints or print statements, making the development process more fluid

Visual programming interfaces that combine sketching, direct manipulation, and code should allow seamless transitions between concrete examples and abstractions

“Scrubbing” values and parameters provides immediate visual feedback and helps explore the solution space more intuitively than typing exact numbers

Programming tools should focus on the programming experience and execution feedback loops rather than just language expressiveness

Future programming environments need to support more fluid experiences where changes are incrementally incorporated into running programs rather than requiring full restarts

Machine learning and AI advancements mean programmers need better tools to stay competitive and become “human-machine learners”

The ideal programming experience should feel like using a water hose - continuous, immediate feedback rather than the current archery-like experience of aim, shoot, evaluate, repeat

Layouts and UI can be sketched and parameterized without writing code directly, automatically inferring relationships and constraints between elements