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Context 1
... is an excellent candidate to explore if we can replace this with a new function that is easier to use. Therefore we define a general purpose 'LOOKUP' block in XLBlocks ( Figure 5). For this function, the user simply specifies the value they are looking for (a), the range that contains the possible lookup values (b) and the range that contains the matching results (c). ...
Context 2
... a reason, they name the text labels on every block. For function names that is obvious, but also the arguments of every function are named (a, b, and c in Figure 5). This is not the case in the formula bar, and according to the participants, it makes the reading of the formula much easier. ...
Context 3
... the term 'output range' lead to some confusion. Especially, in combination with the 'LOOKUP' function that contained an argument that was named 'Result range' (See also c in Figure 5). Also, although constants have a different color than functions, participants P9 and P10 interpreted the constant block that was used to indicate a constant number as the function number (which does not exist in Excel). ...
Context 4
... Drawbacks XLBlocks: For secondary notation, the participants, did not mention any specific drawbacks. Participant P2 remarked that further improvement might be possible if a text field was added to the brown formula block (See Figure 5) that could be used to write some general information about the formula. On the other hand participants, P1 and P2 asked themselves if they would ever use the comments: "Because the block definition of the formula is easier to read, the formula documents itself." ...
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Citations
... The refinement strategy associated with the tool facilitates structuring a spreadsheet into different sections: introduction, data and assumption, model, analysis, macro, and possibly some other sections such as data-entry screen and database lookup. Another tool was also developed which incorporates a block-based formula editor (known as XLBlocks) to replace the default text-based formula editor [80]. ...
Spreadsheets are very common for information processing to support decision making by both professional developers and non-technical end users. Moreover, business intelligence and artificial intelligence are increasingly popular in the industry nowadays, where spreadsheets have been used as, or integrated into, intelligent or expert systems in various application domains. However, it has been repeatedly reported that faults often exist in operational spreadsheets, which could severely compromise the quality of conclusions and decisions based on the spreadsheets. With a view to systematically examining this problem via survey of existing work, we have conducted a comprehensive literature review on the quality issues and related techniques of spreadsheets over a 35.5-year period (from January 1987 to June 2022) for target journals and a 10.5-year period (from January 2012 to June 2022) for target conferences. Among other findings, two major ones are: (a) Spreadsheet quality is best addressed throughout the whole spreadsheet life cycle, rather than just focusing on a few specific stages of the life cycle. (b) Relatively more studies focus on spreadsheet testing and debugging (related to fault detection and removal) when compared with spreadsheet specification, modeling, and design (related to development). As prevention is better than cure, more research should be performed on the early stages of the spreadsheet life cycle. Enlightened by our comprehensive review, we have identified the major research gaps as well as highlighted key research directions for future work in the area.
... In this way, the palette is in the middle. Finally, XLBlocks [69] displays the toolbox at the top of the window and Tica [4] does it in the bottom part. ...
... Stride [82] -Add a frame-based editing (blocks and text) to BlueJ. XLBlocks [69] Blockly Add block-based environment for spreadsheets. NoBug's SnackBar [156] -Measure students' performance in programming tasks. ...
Block-based environments are visual programming environments, which are becoming more and more popular because of their ease of use. The ease of use comes thanks to their intuitive graphical representation and structural metaphors (jigsaw-like puzzles) to display valid combinations of language constructs to the users. Part of the current popularity of block-based environments is thanks to Scratch. As a result they are often associated with tools for children or young learners. However, it is unclear how these types of programming environments are developed and used in general. So we conducted a systematic literature review on block-based environments by studying 152 papers published between 2014 and 2020, and a non-systematic tool review of 32 block-based environments. In particular, we provide a helpful inventory of block-based editors for end-users on different topics and domains. Likewise, we focused on identifying the main components of block-based environments, how they are engineered, and how they are used. This survey should be equally helpful for language engineering researchers and language engineers alike.
... Therefore, we focus in this paper on formula comprehension. In an earlier study [12] we introduced XLBlocks, a block-based formula editor for spreadsheets. With this editor, it is possible to create formulas with a block-based language instead of the default textual formula language and translate them automatically into valid spreadsheet formulas. ...
... Twenty-one of them, working for thirteen companies, accepted the invitation (see Table I). Five of them had participated in our earlier study [12]. All participants use Excel professionally, are accustomed to working with formulas, and have on average twenty-five years of experience with Excel. ...
... The block based programming approach used by App Inventor is key for teaching programming, Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Math (STEAM), and indeed it foster students interest, motivation and empowerment, being usually chosen as entry-point language [2] and usually have a better performance with non-experts in programming [5]. More than that, it has been enabling enthusiasts to build real world prototypes, applications, innovations and business, such as XLBlocks [3], for spreadsheet formulas editor and CoBlox [4], a block-based programming interface for a single-armed industrial robot. ...
This article proposes the BIPES, a
B
lock based
I
ntegrated
P
latform for
E
mbedded
S
ystems, including its architecture, design and validation results. BIPES is an open source software and service that is freely available through the website
http://www.bipes.net.br
and has been conceived from our experience of several years developing embedded systems and Internet of Things (IoT) applications, and teaching. It allows anyone to quickly and reliably design, program, build, deploy and monitor embedded systems, IoT devices and applications using blocks or Python based programming. It is fully based on web environment, so absolutely no software installation is needed on the client developer machine. In this way, a tablet, a netbook, a Chromebook or any other device can be used to program and test several types of devices. Mainly, it relies on MicroPython or CircuitPython, WebREPL, WebSockets, Web Serial API, HTML, JavaScript and Google Blockly to allow no-code programming (blocks) to be translated into Python code and then deployed to the target board. Moreover, it does not require server side processing, so it can be deployed as a Progressive Web Application (PWA), allowing it to be used even when the computer is offline. It is compatible with several low cost boards such as: mBed, BBC micro:bit, ESP8266, ESP32 and Raspberry Pi using only a web browser and without the need to install any software on the device where the user develops the programming.
Block-based programming (BBP) environments have become increasingly commonplace computer science education. Despite a rapidly expanding ecosystem of BBP environments, text-based languages remain the dominant programming paradigm, motivating the transition from BBP to text-based programming (TBP). Support students in transitioning from BBP to TBP is an important and open design question. This work identifies 101 unique BBP environments, analyzes the 46 of them and identifies different design approaches used to support the transition to TBP. The contribution of this work is to provide a snapshot of the current state of BBP environments and how they support learners in transitioning to TBP.
