Programmer Assisted Tool Impact on Static Error Handling Capability of Novices in Imperative First Programming Languages

Abstract

Learning and understanding the syntax of a programming language is an extremely ordeal for novice programmers majoring in computer science. Introduction to programming is offered as a core subject. Novices have to use IDEs to write their programs. These IDEs has a valuable impression of novice error handling skills as static error messages are represented as intricate compiler waffles, terms and puzzling sentences. Docile, easy to understand, simple error messages are of prissy importance to evaluate novice programming aptitude. This research represents the outcomes of programmer assisted tool in natural language for explication of static errors in an imperative first programming language like C. Programmer Assistant tool (PAT) represents natural language description/solution of static errors underpinning Human Computer Interaction (HCI) approach, in the IDE and work as an offline static code analyzer. To assess effectiveness of this PAT novices was directed to write programs in different IDEs first and later using this PAT. Frequency of static errors, error, problem-solving time was analyzed and compared. The result of this study depicts that use of the programmer assisted tool has deep impact on novice performance, motivation and learning outcome. The quantitative mathematical analysis of our study revealed programming assistant tools has significantly influenced programming   and static error handling skills of the students majoring CS.