System and method for context-sensitive help in a design environment
Contents
1. 40 45 50 65 10 ming conventions is an integer which is reflected in the code generated by the tool For example in this case the tool may generate the following int method 1 return 0 Alternatively the return type may be HRESULT resulting in generation of HRESULT method1 result S_OK Similarly if method1 has an input parameter of int i and an output parameter of an integer pointer method1 in int i out int p the tool may generate code to make sure that p is not equal to null and may initialize the pointer so that the following may be generated by the tool HRESULT method int i int p assert p null p 0 As much of the function body can be generated as can be determined from the information available In addition for example address modifiers and parameters and the like can be generated As another example in C interfaces may be implemented publicly or privately When stubs are generated methods can be marked private in which case the method can only be called by casting an object to that specific interface The context sensitive tool provides the option of generating either When typing code to make a connection to a database e g SQL OleDB the context sensitive tool generates code to retrieve a dataset and subsequently close the database using ATL or SQL or other suitable database handling languages For example suppose a user types the fo2. 233 Bl 12 2002 Vaidyanathan et al 717 101 21 Appl 11 672 558 6 571 232 5 2003 Goldberg et al 171 6 697 825 Bl 2 2004 Underwood etal 707 530 22 Filed Feb 8 2007 6 788 317 B2 9 2004 Gardas etal 715 762 7 003 522 Bl 2 2006 Reynar et al 65 7 065 745 B2 6 2006 Chan seine 717 117 Continued US 2007 0168909 Al Jul 19 2007 OTHER PUBLICATIONS Related U S Application Data 63 Continuation of application No 10 218 222 filed on Aug 12 2002 now abandoned Henninger S et al A tool for managing software development knowledge PROFES Bomarius F et al Eds 2001 LNCS 2188 182 195 51 Int CI Continued G06F 9 44 2006 01 52 US CL eer 717 111 717 106 717 112 Primary Examiner Jason Mitchell 58 Field of Classification Search None 74 Attorney Agent or Firm Woodcock Washburn LLP See application file for complete search history 57 ABSTRACT 56 References Cited An intelligent tool for assisting a developer during the cre U S PATENT DOCUMENTS ation or maintenance of software generates an icon when n i ia triggered by input Upon selection of the icon options are 4796179 A 1 1989 tr Pa d tar displayed for potential selection Upon selection of an entry 5 267 155 11 1993 Buchanan etal 364 419 14 Event associated with the entry are deploye
3. com puter 110 may include but are not limited to a processing unit 120 a system memory 130 and a system bus 121 that couples various system components including the system memory to the processing unit 120 The system bus 121 may be any of several types of bus structures including a memory bus or memory controller a peripheral bus and a local bus using any of a variety of bus architectures By way of example and not limitation such architectures include Indus try Standard Architecture ISA bus Micro Channel Archi tecture MCA bus Enhanced ISA EISA bus Video Elec tronics Standards Association VESA local bus and Peripheral Component Interconnect PCI bus also known as Mezzanine bus Computer 110 typically includes a variety of computer readable media Computer readable media can be any avail able media that can be accessed by computer 110 and includes both volatile and nonvolatile media removable and non re movable media By way of example and not limitation com puter readable media may comprise computer storage media and communication media Computer storage media includes both volatile and nonvolatile removable and non removable media implemented in any method or technology for storage of information such as computer readable instructions data structures program modules or other data Computer storage media includes but is not limited to RAM ROM EEPROM flash memory or other memory technology CDROM digital v
4. dismissed at step 517 after a specified period of time or upon positioning the cursor elsewhere and processing returns to step 501 CONCLUSION It is noted that the foregoing examples have been provided merely for the purpose of explanation and are in no way to be an 5 25 40 45 50 65 12 construed as limiting of the present invention While the invention has been described with reference to various embodiments it is understood that the words which have been used herein are words of description and illustration rather than words of limitation Further although the invention has been described herein with reference to particular means materials and embodiments the invention is not intended to be limited to the particulars disclosed herein rather the invention extends to all functionally equivalent structures methods and uses such as are within the scope of the appended claims Those skilled in the art having the benefit of the teachings of this specification may effect numerous modifications thereto and changes may be made without departing from the scope and spirit of the invention in its aspects What is claimed is 1 A method of providing context sensitive help using a programming tool that predicts potential next tasks the method comprising monitoring user actions during source code input detecting a triggering event in the monitored user actions in response to detecting the triggering event de
5. environments and or con figurations that may be suitable for use with the invention include but are not limited to personal computers PCs automated teller machines server computers hand held or laptop devices multi processor systems microprocessor based systems programmable consumer electronics net work PCs minicomputers mainframe computers and the like The invention may also be practiced in distributed com puting environments where tasks are performed by remote processing devices that are linked through a communications network or other data transmission medium In a distributed computing environment program modules may be located in both local and remote computer storage media including memory storage devices FIG 1 thus illustrates an example of a suitable computing system environment 100 in which the invention may be implemented although as made clear above the computing system environment 100 is only one example of a suitable computing environment and is not intended to suggest any limitation as to the scope of use or functionality of the inven tion Neither should the computing environment 100 be inter preted as having any dependency or requirement relating to any one or combination of components illustrated in the exemplary operating environment 100 With reference to FIG 1 an exemplary system for imple menting the invention includes a general purpose computing device in the form of a computer 110 Components of
6. portable and other computing devices of all kinds are contemplated for use in connection with the present invention While a general pur pose computer is described below this is but one example and the present invention requires only a thin client having network server interoperability and interaction Thus the present invention may be implemented in an environment of networked hosted services in which very little or minimal client resources are implicated e g a networked environ ment in which the client device serves merely as a browser or interface to the World Wide Web Although not required the invention can be implemented via an application programming interface API for use by a developer and or included within the network browsing soft ware which will be described in the general context of com puter executable instructions such as program modules being executed by one or more computers such as client workstations servers or other devices Generally program modules include routines programs objects components data structures and the like that perform particular tasks or implement particular abstract data types Typically the func US 7 937 688 B2 3 tionality of the program modules may be combined or dis tributed as desired in various embodiments Moreover those skilled in the art will appreciate that the invention may be practiced with other computer system configurations Other well known computing systems
7. that a programmer or developer types or edits and is written in a given programming language or combination of pro gramming languages Source code typically comprises one or more statements each statement typically comprising one or more expressions and or entities The expressions and or entities in the statement can be made up of multiple compo nents Source code 206 may be persisted onto a stable storage medium Editor 202 in one embodiment is part of an Integrated Development Environment IDE 201 and facilitates the development of the source code 206 of a computer program Editor 202 may be a C editor a C editor a Visual Basic editor a J editor or the like Language service 204 may be optimized for use with Visual C code with Visual C code with Visual Basic code with Visual Java code or the like The programming languages anticipated for inclusion in the list of available language services includes the above mentioned COBOL and any other suitable languages associated with program development Language service 204 may include a dynamic parser as described in U S Pat No 6 367 068 B1 issued on Apr 2 2002 entitled Dynamic Parsing Such a parser may operate to parse the source code 206 according to the parsing rules applicable to the programming language e g a C parser a C parser a Visual Basic parser a J parser or the like The parser may parse only a subset of the source code e g the curren
8. 11 Sheet 4 of 5 US 7 937 688 B2 EDITOR 202 SOURCE CODE WINDOW Y 306 308 Class MyClass IFoo Insert Stubs 402 l Fig 4 U S Patent May 3 2011 Sheet 5 of 5 US 7 937 688 B2 User Types Code 501 Help Triggered 503 Dismiss List 517 Display Icon 505 Dismiss Icon 509 Icon Selected 507 Display List 511 Perform Action 515 Entry Selected 513 Fig 5 US 7 937 688 B2 1 SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR CONTEXT SENSITIVE HELP IN A DESIGN ENVIRONMENT CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS This application is a continuation of patent application Ser No 10 218 222 filed Aug 12 2002 the entire disclosure of which is hereby incorporated by reference in its entirety FIELD OF THE INVENTION This invention relates to the field of computing and in particular to the field of development tools BACKGROUND Programming languages have become more powerful over time through the addition of features and capabilities The increased power and capability of languages has been accom panied by an increase in complexity As software increases in complexity the development of software is becoming more and more difficult Source code may exceed hundreds of pages in length and may involve the use of many different source code files and programming libraries The number and complexity of functions available to a software developer has greatly increased For example m
9. AN 173 but may also include other networks Such networking environments are commonplace in offices enterprise wide computer networks intranets and the Internet When used in a LAN networking environment the com puter 110 is connected to the LAN 171 through a network interface or adapter 170 When used in a WAN networking environment the computer 110 typically includes a modem 172 or other means for establishing communications over the WAN 173 such as the Internet The modem 172 which may be internal or external may be connected to the system bus 121 via the user input interface 160 or other appropriate mechanism In a networked environment program modules depicted relative to the computer 110 or portions thereof may be stored in the remote memory storage device By way of example and not limitation FIG 1 illustrates remote application programs 185 as residing on memory device 181 It will be appreciated that the network connections shown are exemplary and other means of establishing a communications link between the computers may be used One of ordinary skill in the art can appreciate that a com puter 110 or other client device can be deployed as part of a computer network In this regard the present invention per tains to any computer system having any number of memory or storage units and any number of applications and pro cesses occurring across any number of storage units or vol umes The present invention may apply to
10. Corel Corporation Limited Corel InfoCentral User s Manual 1996 vol 1 Version 7 0 1996 1 thru 86 Corel Office Professional 7 Quick Results 1 531 1993 Novell GroupWise User s Guide for Windows 16 Bit Version 5 2 1993 1997 1 231 Novell Group Wise User s Guide for Windows 32 Bit 1998 Novell Inc 1 318 Claris for Macintosh Claris Emailer Getting Started 1995 1997 Claris Corporation 61 pages Developer s Guide to Apple Data Detectors For Version 1 0 2 Apple Computer Inc 1997 1 34 Apple Data Detectors User s Manual O 1997 Apple Computer Inc 1 16 Nardi B A etal Collaborative Programmable Intelligent Agents Mar 1998 Apple Computer advanced Technology Group 1 11 Ye et al Integrating Active Information Delivery and Reuse Reposi tory Systems 2000 AMC SIGSOFT 60 68 Appl No 09 907 418 filed Jul 17 2001 Reynar et al Appl No 09 906 467 filed Jul 16 2001 Reynar et al Appl No 09 906 552 filed Jul 16 2001 Reynar et al Appl No 10 020 343 filed Dec 10 2001 Hough et al Appl No 09 995 224 filed Nov 26 2001 Klein et al Appl No 09 841 265 filed Apr 24 2001 Reynar Appl No 09 841 266 filed Apr 24 2001 Reynar Appl No 09 191 757 filed Nov 13 1998 Vaidyanathan et al Appl No 09 588 411 filed Jun 6 2000 Reynar et al Appl No 10 179 438 filed Jun 25 2002 Reynar et al Appl No 10 179 810 filed Ju
11. US007937688B2 az United States Patent 10 Patent No US 7 937 688 B2 Vaidyanathan et al 45 Date of Patent May 3 2011 54 SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR 5 499 371 A 3 1996 Henninger etal 717 108 CONTEXT SENSITIVE HELP IN A DESIGN 5 522 079 A 5 1996 Ackeretal e 717 170 5 699 310 A 12 1997 Garloff et al 717 108 ENVIRONMENT 5 813 019 A 9 1998 Van De Vanter 715 236 5 815 830 9 1998 Anthony 707 758 75 Inventors Shankar Vaidyanathan Sammamish 5 859 636 A 1 1999 Pandit 345 335 WA US Randy S Kimmerly 5 946 647 A 8 1999 Miller et al we 704 9 Woodinville WA US Biliana K 6 066 181 A 5 2000 DeMaster lt 717 148 S 6 085 201 A 7 2000 Tso sss 2 707 505 Kaneva Kirkland WA US 6 122 647 A 9 2000 Horowitz et al lt 707 513 6 163 879 12 2000 Mackey 7171 73 Assignee Microsoft Corporation Redmond WA 6 182 274 1 2001 717 104 US 6 269 475 Bl 7 2001 Farrell et al 717 2 6 289 513 B1 9 2001 Bentwich T 717 106 Notice Subject to any disclaimer the term of this 6 305 008 B1 10 2001 Vaidyanathan et al ve 717 4 patent is extended or adjusted under 35 6 311 323 Bl 10 2001 Shulman et al 717 1 6 314 559 11 2001 Sollich 717 5 U S C 154 b by 995 days 6 367 068 Bl 4 2002 Vaidyanathan et al 717 8 6 502
12. an environment with server computers and client computers deployed in a network environment having remote or local storage The present invention may also apply to a standalone computing device having programming language functionality inter pretation and execution capabilities Context Sensitive Help in a Development Environment A context sensitive design time tool dynamically monitors user e g developer input during software development When the tool intelligently determines a potential next task or tasks an icon is generated Upon selection of the icon a list of potential next task s is displayed Upon selection of an entry the task is automatically performed Automatically per formed tasks include but are not limited to automatically inserting code into a source program FIG 2 is a block diagram illustrating an exemplary system for monitoring user input and proffering a list of potential next tasks in accordance with one embodiment of the inven 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60 65 6 tion The system includes a context sensitive potential next task determiner 205 a file database 203 optional a lan guage service 204 and an editor 202 within a design environ ment 201 for drafting and editing source code 206 Those of ordinary skill in the art will appreciate that the design envi ronment 201 may also include other components not shown in FIG 2 Source code 206 typically is a set of instructions
13. ay include a compiler symbol table for example a C or J symbol table stored in a database or a separate file for example a C file generated by a portion of the language 25 30 40 45 55 65 8 service 204 Alternatively a file or database in memory not shown may be accessed for example a Visual Basic com piler symbol table stored in a database in memory Tables files databases and the like whether stored in memory on persisted to a stable storage medium are contemplated by the invention Alternatively file database 203 while appearing as one database to the user actually may be comprised of mul tiple stores or databases For example a first database e g a project database may be dynamically updated by the parser as described above In addition the pre built database may contain information that seldom changes such as the operat ing system definitions and header files and MFC ATL class definitions and header files referred to above Those of ordi nary skill in the art will recognize that other class definitions and header files could be included in the pre built database One or more pre built databases may exist Continuing the example described above in which method stubs for an interface can be automatically generated assume the following line of code was entered class CFoo public IBar Upon entering following class CFoo public the methods of IBar are retrieved by accessin
14. d 5 392 386 A 2 1995 Chalas 395 155 5 452 449 A 9 1995 Baldwin Jr et al 355 600 3 Claims 5 Drawing Sheets Dismiss Icon 509 Perform Action 515 US 7 937 688 B2 Page 2 U S PATENT DOCUMENTS 7 325 194 B2 1 2008 Arayasantiparb et al 7 346 892 B2 3 2008 Shou etal 717 112 7 707 024 B2 4 2010 Arayasantiparb et al 7 707 496 Bl 4 2010 Abbar et al 7 742 048 Bl 6 2010 Abbar et al 2002 0062475 Al 5 2002 Iborra etal 717 108 2002 0083415 Al 6 2002 Jazdzewski 717 111 2002 0104072 Al 8 2002 Ecker etal 717 10 2003 0093769 A1 5 2003 Kumar 717 108 2003 0221184 Al 11 2003 Gunmjaletal 717 118 2003 0233632 Al 12 2003 Aigen etal 717 106 2006 0090154 Al 4 2006 Bustelo etal 717 110 2006 0206866 9 2006 Eldrigeetal 717 122 OTHER PUBLICATIONS Kucza T et al Improving knowledge management in software reuse process PROFES Bomarius F et al Eds 2001 LNCS 2188 141 152 Breidenbach G Programmable Keyboard Controller Electronic Praxis 2001 6 68 70 English Language Abstract Holmes N Seven Great Blunders of the Computing World Com puter 2002 110 112 Zagler W L Text Generation for Disabled Persons Using Word Prediction OEGAI Journal 2001 20 2 21 22 English Language Abstract IBM Research Ecli
15. ect node and right clicking on classview followed by filling in requested information are preferably eliminated by providing an option in the list to perform the task previously performed by the wizard Preferably the IDE is open such that third parties can author their own language services thereby augmenting the features of the standard text editor to conform to their lan guage such as colorization of their syntax elements provid ing formatting and automatic indent capabilities and the like Language services are also employed in the environ ment to provide information to the various browsers and help systems and also to provide useful information to the debug ger if appropriate In the context of this invention the lan guage service is given the opportunity to make use of the context sensitive help functionality in accordance with one embodiment of the invention so as to present the next task options while editing FIG 5 is a flow diagram of a method of providing context sensitive help in accordance with one embodiment of the invention At step 501 as source code is entered or edited each keystroke or sequence of keystrokes is parsed to deter mine if the keystroke or sequence of keystrokes is a context sensitive help trigger At step 503 if it is determined that the keystroke or sequence of keystrokes is not a context sensitive help trigger processing returns to step 501 At step 503 if it is determined that the key
16. ersatile disks DVD or other optical disk storage magnetic cassettes magnetic tape magnetic disk storage or other mag netic storage devices or any other medium which can be used to store the desired information and which can be accessed by computer 110 Communication media typically embodies computer readable instructions data structures program modules or other data in a modulated data signal such as a carrier wave or other transport mechanism and includes any information delivery media The term modulated data sig nal means a signal that has one or more of its characteristics 5 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 65 4 set or changed in such a manner as to encode information in the signal By way of example and not limitation communi cation media includes wired media such as a wired network or direct wired connection and wireless media such as acoustic RF infrared and other wireless media Combinations of any of the above should also be included within the scope of computer readable media The system memory 130 includes computer storage media in the form of volatile and or nonvolatile memory such as read only memory ROM 131 and random access memory RAM 132 A basic input output system 133 BIOS con taining the basic routines that help to transfer information between elements within computer 110 such as during start up is typically stored in ROM 131 RAM 132 typically con tains data and or progra
17. g database 203 In this case database 203 includes a list of all the methods of IBar As another example assume the developer is authoring a new class and declares it to implement an interface called TEnumerable At this point in accordance with one embodi ment of the invention an icon would be displayed which upon selection provides an entry offering to provide stub implementations of all the members of IEnumerable to the new class since that is a requirement of implementing the interface The database 203 contains the information about the interface IEnumerable including the names and signa tures of the methods it has what interfaces it extends etc It should be understood that the examples recited above are exemplary only and any suitable content for and use of data base 203 is contemplated by the invention Thus inaccordance with one embodiment of the invention the system of FIG 2 operates as follows A user e g a developer drafts source code 206 with editor 202 As the developer generates the source code 206 one of the compo nents of IDE 201 detects an event and invokes context sensi tive help module 205 Context sensitive help module 205 then displays an icon Ifthe icon is selected context sensitive help module 205 parses the code fragment using information from file database 203 to provide context sensitive choices to the developer concerning potential next tasks Upon selec tion of one or more entries the ta
18. gering event in response to determining the action associated with the triggering event offering to execute the action and in response to the user accepting the offer performing the associated action wherein an external data source is accessed and wherein sections of code comprising more than a single word are automatically entered into the source code by the programming tool based on informa tion stored in the external data source wherein the triggering event comprises entering code that when executed makes a connection to an external data base and wherein the associated action comprises gen erating code to retrieve a dataset specified in the entered code and to close the external database and entering the generated code into the source code wherein the trig gering event further comprises entering code in the source code that specifies a password for accessing the US 7 937 688 B2 13 external database and wherein the associated action comprises hiding the password 3 A system for providing context sensitive help using a programming tool that predicts potential next tasks compris ing a processor memory having stored therein computer executable instructions comprising monitoring user actions during source code input detecting a triggering event in the monitored user actions in response to detecting the triggering event determin ing an action associated with the triggering event in response to determining t
19. he action associated with the triggering event offering to execute the action and in response to the user accepting the offer performing the associated action wherein an external data source 5 14 is accessed and wherein sections of code comprising more than a single word are automatically entered into the source code by the programming tool based on information stored in the external data source wherein the triggering event comprises entering code that when executed makes a connection to an external data base and wherein the associated action comprises gen erating code to retrieve a dataset specified in the entered code and to close the external database and entering the generated code into the source code wherein the trig gering event further comprises entering code in the source code that specifies a password for accessing the external database and wherein the associated action comprises hiding the password
20. ing the cursor over the icon or otherwise selecting the icon using methods known in the art the user is prompted with a statement such as but not limited to Do you want to implement stubs for interface IFoo Upon selection of the entry or otherwise indicating assent using methods known in the art the function body stub code would be automatically generated in the user s source code instance For example in this case the following code may be generated void method 1 J void method2 eliminating the need for the user to type in this code and eliminating any mistakes the user might make in the process and potentially increasing the productivity of the developer In the case of MFC ATL in C accepting the icon s changes preferably would also involve making the appropri ate changes to the COM map a macro wrapped structure used to track all the interfaces implemented by a given class While the example above relates to interfaces it will be understood that the tool is intended to handle regular base classes as well as interfaces With base classes a subset or all of the base s virtual methods can be overridden Similarly it should be understood that although the above example is simple to aid in understanding the generation of code is not restricted to beginning and ending braces For example perhaps is defined with attribute integer Inthis case the return type in accordance with C program
21. llowing connection string into source code SQL Connect Database MySQL PWD hello The context sensitive tool triggered in this case by the refer ence to a database and user followed by the sequence of letter PWD denoting password generates an icon which when selected proffers the option of hiding the password ina registry for example Upon selection of the option code including that code needed to create the necessary user classes etc is generated the appropriate existing code is removed and replaced with the tool generated code When typing code if a user sees a squiggly a wavy line commonly used to denote an error condition of some sort and hovers over the squiggly the context sensitive tool preferably generates an icon proffering ways to correct the code The fix may include adding a missing semicolon or closing brace or identifying and correcting a typographical error in an unde fined type Alternatively Knowledge Base KB articles a user Shankar US 7 937 688 B2 11 good source of information regarding common issues or questions or websites such as www msdn com may be accessed by establishing a connection to the Internet to iden tify an appropriate correction When typing in a declaration of a function or method or other element implementation can be automatically gener ated by accessing files generated by a compiler or dynamic parser Wizards presently invoked by identifying a corr
22. m modules that are immediately accessible to and or presently being operated on by process ing unit 120 By way of example and not limitation FIG 1 illustrates operating system 134 application programs 135 other program modules 136 and program data 137 The computer 110 may also include other removable non removable volatile nonvolatile computer storage media By way of example only FIG 1 illustrates a hard disk drive 141 that reads from or writes to non removable nonvolatile mag netic media a magnetic disk drive 151 that reads from or writes to a removable nonvolatile magnetic disk 152 and an optical disk drive 155 that reads from or writes to a remov able nonvolatile optical disk 156 such as aCD ROM or other optical media Other removable non removable volatile nonvolatile computer storage media that can be used in the exemplary operating environment include but are not limited to magnetic tape cassettes flash memory cards digital ver satile disks digital video tape solid state RAM solid state ROM and the like The hard disk drive 141 is typically connected to the system bus 121 through a non removable memory interface such as interface 140 and magnetic disk drive 151 and optical disk drive 155 are typically connected to the system bus 121 by a removable memory interface such as interface 150 The drives and their associated computer storage media discussed above and illustrated in FIG 1 provide storage of compute
23. n 25 2002 Helfrich et al oodd cited by examiner US 7 937 688 B2 Sheet 1 of 5 May 3 2011 U S Patent 914 Lavyord SINVHDONd 587 NOILVOl lddV 3103 PPL LOL INALSAS SNILV zZdO NOILVOMddv WvioOtd esnojy 291 YAHLO epeq 251 OFT yndy 1esfi s jnpo JEL 19910 SEL uoneoiddy LZL sng uejs s 99 j19ju uk soIudeJs Al 061 5 5 PEL Buneisdo ZET yun Buisseo2oJd uiejs S 09 041 YIOMJON 99 yndjno oer ALOWSY bLb yIOMJON e20 siayeedg5l 96h 7 RIS 61 10 1 U S Patent May 3 2011 Sheet 2 of 5 US 7 937 688 B2 FILE DATABASE 203 LANGUAGE SERVICE 204 CONTEXT SENSITIVE HELP EDITOR TOOL 202 205 SOURCE CODE 206 Fig 2 U S Patent May 3 2011 Sheet 3 of 5 US 7 937 688 B2 IDE 201 EDITOR 202 SOURCE CODE WINDOW y m 308 Class MyClass IFoo Fig 3 U S Patent May 3 20
24. ov 13 1998 entitled Automated Help Information for Reference Information now U S Pat No 6 502 233 A completion module for auto completion of programming statements may also be available within the IDE as described in U S Pat No 6 305 008 issued Oct 16 2001 entitled Automatic Statement Completion Such a tool may be invoked as a developer is writing code and may display a list of potential completion candidates to the devel oper The developer may then pick the desired candidate or continue typing freeing the developer from having to consult printed or on line documentation class hierarchies or other source code files To date however a tool that can intelligently understand what the user e g developer is doing and help the user accomplish the next set of tasks is not known It would be 25 40 45 50 65 2 helpful if there were a tool that could track the intentions of a user and proffer up a list of options of potential next tasks based on the user s action SUMMARY A context sensitive design time tool monitors user input during a program development or program maintenance operation and displays an icon when user input triggers a potential next task or tasks Upon selection of the icon the tool proffers a list of possible next tasks Upon selection of an entry in the list the task is automatically performed BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS The foregoing summary as well as the follo
25. played within window 308 Context sensitive help tool 205 generates icon 302 when triggered by the keystrokes input by the user Upon selection of icon 302 icon 302 is dismissed and a list 402 of potential tasks is displayed For example assume that a developer is writing C code using the C language service 202 Assume a public inter face class IFoo exists in database 203 interface IFoo hav ing two member methods method1 and method2 Because IFoo is an interface method1 and method2 are pure methods and are not implemented If for example a user types class MyClass public IFoo into source code 306 the context sensitive tool will detect that the user may intend to imple ment the IFoo interface so that the pure virtual methods of IFoo will need to be overridden in MyClass Context sensi tive help tool 205 is triggered by the colon the colon indicat ing to the tool 205 that the word that follows 1 IFoo probably is a class such as an interface or base class The tool includes heuristics for determining possible next tasks i e implement the interface by overriding any pure methods of interface IFoo and thereby determines that the user will probably want to write function bodies for methodl and method2 Upon determining the possible next task or tasks the tool displays an icon 302 in the vicinity of the user input indicating that a potential next task has been determined Upon selection of the icon by hover
26. pse http www research ibm com eclipse Home page 2 pages Sep 29 2003 JetBrains IntelliJ IDEA the best Java IDE around http www intellij com page Sep 23 2009 Slickedit Code Editor C Editor Java Editor HTML Editor XML Editor Unicode Editor http www slickedit com 1 page Sep 29 2003 Source Insight Program Editor and Analyzer http www sourcedyn com index html 2 pages Sep 29 2003 Borland CodeWright The Programmer s Editing System http www premia com 1 page Sep 29 2003 Chalmers Physical Resource Theory The Complex Adaptive Sys tems Programme of year 2000 http www fit fy chalmers se kristian software html 1 page Sep 29 2003 Emacs W3 v 4 0 http www cs indiana edu elisp w3 docs html page Sep 29 2003 Vi Unix text editor http www indiana edu ucspubs b104 ztoc html 8 pages Sep 29 2003 Anderson K M et al Chimera Hypertext for Heterogeneous Soft ware Environments Association for Computing Machinery 1994 ECHT 94 Proceedings Department of Information and Computer Science University of California Irvine California USA 94 107 Hughes G et al Microsoft Smart Tags Support Ignore or Con demn Them Association of Computing Machinery Jun 11 15 2002 80 81 Lewis P H et al Media based Navigation with Generic Links Association of Computing Machinery 1996 The Multimedia Research group Department of Electronics and Com
27. puter Science University of Southampton England 215 223 Middel C D Software Configuration and Change Management Proceedings 5 Conference on Quality Engineering in Software Technology 2001 239 245 English Language Abstract Jewell D Windows Shell Secrets EXE 1999 13 9 35 45 Kramer B 3D LISP Tools Cadence 1989 4 5 130 134 Lin C F et al Chinese Text Distinction and Font Identification by Recognizing most Frequently Used Characters Image and Vision Computing 2001 19 329 338 Willisson Pace et al ISPELL UNIX Man Pages Aug 23 2003 73 pages SED 1 BSD Reference Manual sedMan txt 6 pages Dec 30 1993 McMahon L E SED A Non Interactive Text Editor Bell Labo ratories Aug 15 1978 10 pages The Complete Red Hat Linux Operating System 5 2 Deluxe Macmillan Digital Publishing U S A 385 pages 1998 CoStar User s Manual For AddressMate and AddressMate Plus CoStar Corp 1994 1995 pp 1 1 thru Index 210 Beitner N D et al Multimedia Support and Authoring in Micro cosm An Extended Model Department of Electronics and Com puter Science University of Southampton 12 pages 1994 IBM Research Disclosure 368 Multimedia Hyperlinks Automati cally Created for Reference Documents Jun 1993 5 pages Microsoft Office 97 User s Manual Getting Results with Microsoft Office 97 Real World Solutions for the Work You Do 1997 1 703
28. r readable instructions data structures program modules and other data for the computer 110 In FIG 1 for example hard disk drive 141 is illustratedas storing operating system 144 application programs 145 other program mod ules 146 and program data 147 Note that these components can either be the same as or different from operating system 134 application programs 135 other program modules 136 and program data 137 Operating system 144 application programs 145 other program modules 146 and program data 147 are given different numbers here to illustrate that at a minimum they are different copies A user may enter com mands and information into the computer 110 through input devices such as a keyboard 162 and pointing device 161 commonly referred to as a mouse trackball or touch pad Other input devices not shown may include a microphone joystick game pad satellite dish scanner or the like These and other input devices are often connected to the processing unit 120 through a user input interface 160 that is coupled to the system bus 121 but may be connected by other interface and bus structures such as a parallel port game port or a universal serial bus USB A monitor 191 or other type of display device is also connected to the system bus 121 via an interface such as a video interface 190 A graphics interface 182 such as North bridge may also be connected to the system bus 121 North bridge is a chipset that comm
29. rogramming Interface such as SQLConnect Entering SQLConnect indicates that the next set oftasks to be performed is to use the SQL connection to retrieve or input data to the database It should be under stood that the particular examples are exemplary only and other suitable triggering sequences are contemplated In determining potential next tasks file database 203 may be accessed File database 203 may include information on entities in the source code File database 203 typically is a file comprising a database that in one embodiment of the inven tion is used by the parser to store information including but not limited to class definitions member data types and ref erence information such as source file names and line num bers where an identifier token or function name is defined or referenced as described in co pending application Attorney Docket No MSFT 1249 filed concurrently herewith entitled System and Method for Browse Information Parsing With out Compilation and is populated and maintained by the parser File database 203 typically also includes information not only from source code 206 but also includes information from other sources including system header files Microsoft Foundation Class MFC header files and ActiveX Template Libraries ATL all of which are known in the art In one embodiment of the invention file database 203 is referred to as a No Compile Browse NCB file File database 203 m
30. se of adding method stubs to an interface entering the interface name as part of the class definition is the triggering event US 7 937 688 B2 7 For example suppose the user types class CFoo public IBar the input of IBar following class Cfoo public triggers the display of an icon Upon further user input as described below the automatic addition of stubs for all the methods of IBar can be effected As another example assume that a developer has written an interface such as the following interface IEmployee string Name get set int Age get set Assume also that the developer has written several classes that implement this interface Each of these classes therefore have a Name property and an Age property as required by the contract of the interface Next say the developer realizes that the Employee inter face also needs a Salary property Using the code editor the developer may change the interface to look like this interface IEmployee string Name get set int Age get set decimal Salary get set At the point when the newly added property is complete in the editor an icon would appear and when clicked or other wise selected an option to automatically add stub implemen tations of the Salary property to all classes that implement Iemployee would be displayed Another exemplary triggering sequence is usage of some specific API Application P
31. sk or tasks associated with the entry or entries is performed In one embodiment of the invention the event invoking the context sensitive help mod ule 205 is the entry of certain pre determined programming language defined constructs The icon in one embodiment of the invention is displayed in the editor near the triggering character or sequence of characters In response to user selection of the icon by posi tioning a cursor over the icon or by selecting the icon in other ways known in the art a window 1s generated displaying a list The list preferably includes one or more potential next task s Upon selection of an entry or a series of entries in the list by clicking on the entry or entries or by selecting the entry or entries using other ways known in the art the task associated with the list entry is automatically performed FIG 3 is a block diagram illustrating a representative screen shot of a section of source code in an editor showing the appearance of an icon in accordance with one aspect of the invention FIG 4 is a block diagram illustrating a represen US 7 937 688 B2 9 tative screen shot of a section of source code in an editor showing a list of potential tasks in accordance with one aspect of the invention Within a design environment such as an Integrated Design Environment IDE 201 a C editor 202 enables the cre ation or editing of C source code 306 as depicted in win dow 308 Source code 306 is dis
32. stroke or sequence of keystrokes is a context sensitive help trigger a context sensitive help icon is gener ated and displayed close to the triggering keystroke s at step 505 At step 507 if the icon is not selected within a designated time period the icon is dismissed at step 509 and processing returns to step 501 At step 507 if the icon is selected a list of entries is generated and displayed at step 511 The list of entries includes possible next actions that a user might take If one or more of the entries is selected at step 513 the action associated with the entry or entries is performed at step 515 and a section of code within a source code file may be added ora section of code originally included within the source code file may be removed and replaced with a section of code generated by the context sensitive help engine or a section of code originally included within the source code file may be modified For example suppose a user is modifying the declaration definition of a type or method an icon may be displayed Upon selection of the icon an entry may be displayed sug gesting to modify all the places where the type method is being referenced Upon selection of the action all the places where the type method are referenced are modified It should be understood that the example cited is merely exemplary and any suitable actions and entries are contemplated by the invention Ifan entry is not selected at step 513 the list is
33. t function or method being edited The parser may include heuristics to ignore certain non fatal errors such as but not limited to missing statement terminators missing closing parenthesis missing function terminators and the like Similarly language service 204 may include an auto matic statement completion module an automated help mod ule and or a statement building and information tool as described above Language service 204 may include a compiler such as but not limited to a C compiler a C compiler a Visual Basic compiler and or a J compiler Typically a compiler includes a parser and a component that builds executable code A parser receives input in the form of sequential source program instructions interactive online commands markup tags or some other defined interface and breaks them up into parts For example a parser may break source code into nouns objects verbs methods and their attributes or options A parser may also check to see that all necessary input has been provided Language service 204 preferably includes context sensi tive tool 205 Alternatively the context sensitive tool may exist external to language service 204 The context sensitive next task help tool 205 parses user keystrokes for a triggering character or sequence of characters as the keystrokes are input Upon detection of a triggering character or sequence of characters the tool determines potential next tasks For example in the ca
34. termining an action associated with the triggering event in response to determining the action associated with the triggering event offering to execute the action and in response to the user accepting the offer performing the associated action wherein an external data source is accessed and wherein sections of code comprising more than a single word are automatically entered into the source code by the programming tool based on informa tion stored in the external data source wherein the triggering event comprises entering code that when executed makes a connection to an external data base and wherein the associated action comprises gen erating code to retrieve a dataset specified in the entered code and to close the external database and entering the generated code into the source code wherein the trig gering event further comprises entering code in the source code that specifies a password for accessing the external database and wherein the associated action comprises hiding the password 2 A computer readable storage medium for providing con text sensitive help using a programming tool that predicts potential next tasks the computer readable storage medium having stored thereon computer executable instructions com prising monitoring user actions during source code input detecting a triggering event in the monitored user actions in response to detecting the triggering event determining an action associated with the trig
35. ultiple functions or meth ods within a class hierarchy may share the same name or identifier but have different numbers of parameters or dif ferent parameter types A large number of identifiers may be used including typedefs variables macros parameters namespaces templates attributes and so on Each of these identifiers typically requires a type declaration and or defini tion specified Hence programming tools that make develop ment efforts easier and more accurate are widely desired One way to make the task of the developer more manage able is to establish an Integrated Development Environment IDE These environments typically include browsers and editors enabling developers to edit multiple source files For object oriented languages the IDE may also provide a browser that enables a developer to navigate and view the class hierarchy To further assist the programming effort an IDE may support some kind of on line statement building mechanism such as the one described in U S Pat No 6 311 323 B1 issued Oct 30 2001 entitled Computer Program ming Language Statement Building and Information Tool help information mechanism may enable a developer to refer to on line documentation describing varying function defini tions In addition an IDE may provide automatic help mod ules displaying reference information associated with identi fiers and so on as described in U S patent application Ser No 09 191 757 filed N
36. unicates with the CPU or host processing unit 120 and assumes responsibility for acceler US 7 937 688 B2 5 ated graphics port AGP communications One or more graphics processing units GPUs 184 may communicate with graphics interface 182 In this regard GPUs 184 gener ally include on chip memory storage such as register storage and GPUs 184 communicate with a video memory 186 GPUs 184 however are but one example of a coprocessor and thus a variety of coprocessing devices may be included in com puter 110 A monitor 191 or other type of display device is also connected to the system bus 121 via an interface such as a video interface 190 which may in turn communicate with video memory 186 In addition to monitor 191 computers may also include other peripheral output devices such as speakers 197 and printer 196 which may be connected through an output peripheral interface 195 The computer 110 may operate in a networked environ ment using logical connections to one or more remote com puters such as a remote computer 180 The remote computer 180 may be a personal computer a server a router a network PC a peer device or other common network node and typi cally includes many or all of the elements described above relative to the computer 110 although only a memory storage device 181 has been illustrated in FIG 1 The logical connec tions depicted in FIG 1 include a local area network LAN 171 and a wide area network W
37. wing detailed description of preferred embodiments is better understood when read in conjunction with the appended drawings For the purpose of illustrating the invention there is shown in the drawings exemplary constructions of the invention however the invention is not limited to the specific methods and instru mentalities disclosed In the drawings FIG 1 is a block diagram of an exemplary computing environment in which aspects of the invention may be imple mented FIG 2 is a block diagram of a system that generates a context sensitive list of potential next tasks in accordance with one embodiment of the invention FIG 3 is a block diagram illustrating a representative screen shot of a section of source code in an editor showing the appearance of an icon in accordance with one aspect ofthe invention FIG 4 is a block diagram illustrating a representative screen shot of a section of source code in an editor showing a list of potential tasks in accordance with one aspect of the invention and FIG 5 is a flow diagram of a method for generating a context sensitive list of potential next tasks in accordance with one embodiment of the invention DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION Exemplary Computing Environment FIG 1 and the following discussion are intended to provide a brief general description of a suitable computing environ ment in which the invention may be implemented It should be understood however that handheld
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