PART
5
Natural Language
16. Going beyond PBD: A play-by-play and mixed-initiative approach
17. Knowing what you’re talking about: Natural language programming of a multi-player online game
This section of the book explores the role natural language plays in end user programming systems. The first chapter proposes a “sloppy programming” model that takes its inspiration from keyword search interfaces and describes techniques for enabling a sloppy programming environment in the browser. This technique was used in the CoScripter system described in Part 2 of this text, “Customizing and Automating.” The PLOW system shows how a natural language spoken explanation can be combined with programming by demonstration to help a system learn procedures from a single example, such as finding hotels near an address.
Finally, the MOOIDE system describes how to leverage an English language parser and commonsense knowledge base to produce a natural language programming environment for multi-player storytelling games.