Programming as an Experience: The Inspiration for Self

Abstract. The Self system attempts to integrate intellectual and non-intellectual aspects of programming to create an overall experience. The language semantics, user interface, and implementation each help create this integrated experience. The language semantics embed the programmer in a uniform world of simple ob-jects that can be modified without appealing to definitions of abstractions. In a similar way, the graphical interface puts the user into a uniform world of tangible objects that can be directly manipulated and changed without switching modes. The implementation strives to support the world-of-objects illusion by minimiz-ing perceptible pauses and by providing true source-level semantics without sac-rificing performance. As a side benefit, it encourages factoring. Although we see areas that fall short of the vision, on the whole, the language, interface, and im-plementation conspire so that the Self programmer lives and acts in a consistent and malleable world of objects.