Specialized languages: an applications methodology

Abstract

One objective of the information processing community is to aid the problem-solving activities of its clients. In this paper we will discuss a methodology for serving the needs of the "user", that is, the end-user: the manager running an organization, the accountant understanding the financial condition of a company, the anthropologist studying a culture, the engineer designing some equipment, or the meteorologist predicting the weather. Each of these users has his own particular, idiosyncratic problems. The computer should be an effective tool for him in dealing with these problems. Our methodology is designed to provide each of these users with an appropriate interface to the computer, with a language which is natural to his view of reality. In this paper we examine the nature of today's ubiquitous applications packages, discuss our notion of applications languages and present some of our experience with the REL system, which has been designed to incorporate our views on specialized user languages.

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