Repository logo

Infoscience

  • English
  • French
Log In
Logo EPFL, École polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne

Infoscience

  • English
  • French
Log In
  1. Home
  2. Academic and Research Output
  3. Conferences, Workshops, Symposiums, and Seminars
  4. Improving API Documentation for Java-like Languages
 
conference paper not in proceedings

Improving API Documentation for Java-like Languages

Dubochet, Gilles  
•
Malayeri, Donna
2010
Evaluation and Usability of Programming Languages and Tools

The Javadoc paradigm for displaying API documentation to users is quite popular, with similar variants existing for many mainstream languages. However, two user interface design properties of Javadoc may reduce its utility when displaying documentation for APIs that make use of inheritance and parametric polymorphism. First, Javadoc does not show a flattened view of all members of a class or interface, but rather only those defined directly in the type. Second, and as a consequence, any methods whose types contain type parameters of a superclass will always be shown in the context of the superclass. That is, if the method C.m returns type T, subclasses of C will always see this parent signature, even if they instantiate T to a concrete type such as Integer. We show that this situation arises often in some libraries, and present the results of a study that measures the usability consequences of these two Javadoc design decisions. Our results show that a user interface that shows instantiated type parameters for members is preferred over one that presents type parameters in the Javadoc style.

  • Files
  • Details
  • Metrics
Type
conference paper not in proceedings
Author(s)
Dubochet, Gilles  
Malayeri, Donna
Date Issued

2010

Subjects

Javadoc

•

Scaladoc

•

Documentation

•

Java

•

Scala

•

Programming language

•

API

URL

URL

http://ecs.victoria.ac.nz/Events/PLATEAU
Editorial or Peer reviewed

REVIEWED

Written at

EPFL

EPFL units
LAMP1  
LBS  
Event nameEvent placeEvent date
Evaluation and Usability of Programming Languages and Tools

Reno, Nevada, USA

October 18, 2010

Available on Infoscience
September 9, 2010
Use this identifier to reference this record
https://infoscience.epfl.ch/handle/20.500.14299/53487
Logo EPFL, École polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne
  • Contact
  • infoscience@epfl.ch

  • Follow us on Facebook
  • Follow us on Instagram
  • Follow us on LinkedIn
  • Follow us on X
  • Follow us on Youtube
AccessibilityLegal noticePrivacy policyCookie settingsEnd User AgreementGet helpFeedback

Infoscience is a service managed and provided by the Library and IT Services of EPFL. © EPFL, tous droits réservés