April 6, 2010
Emerson Murphy-Hill
Tools that perform semi-automated software restructuring (refactoring) are currently under-utilized by programmers. If more programmers adopted refactoring tools, software projects could make enormous productivity gains. However, as more advanced refactoring tools are designed, a great chasm widens between how the tools must be used and how programmers want to use them. This talk discusses work that begins to bridge this chasm by exposing usability guidelines to direct the design of the next generation of programmer-friendly refactoring tools, so that refactoring tools fit the way programmers behave, not vice-versa.