Evaluating a Natural Language Interface for Behavioral Programming

In behavioral programming, scenarios are used to program the behavior of reactive systems. Behavioral programming originated in the language of live sequence charts (LSC), a visual formalism based on multi-modal scenarios, and supported by a mechanism for directly executing a system described by a set of LSCs. In an exploratory experiment, we compare programming using LSCs with procedural programming using Java, and seek the best interface for creating the visual artifact of LSCs. Several interfaces for creating LSCs were tested, among them a novel interactive natural language interface (NL). Our preliminary results indicate that even experts in procedural programming preferred the LSCs NL interface over the Java alternative, and their implementation times were comparable to those of the other interfaces tested. The results indicate that the NL interface, combined with the scenario-based essence of LSCs, may be a viable alternative to conventional programming.