Marco T. MorazánSeton Hall University, Tijana MinićSeton Hall University
{"title":"有限状态自动机到/从正则表达式可视化","authors":"Marco T. MorazánSeton Hall University, Tijana MinićSeton Hall University","doi":"arxiv-2407.08088","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"Most Formal Languages and Automata Theory courses explore the duality between\ncomputation models to recognize words in a language and computation models to\ngenerate words in a language. For students unaccustomed to formal statements,\nthese transformations are rarely intuitive. To assist students with such\ntransformations, visualization tools can play a pivotal role. This article\npresents visualization tools developed for FSM -- a domain-specific language\nfor the Automata Theory classroom -- to transform a finite state automaton to a\nregular expression and vice versa. Using these tools, the user may provide an\narbitrary finite-state machine or an arbitrary regular expression and step\nforward and step backwards through a transformation. At each step, the\nvisualization describes the step taken. The tools are outlined, their\nimplementation is described, and they are compared with related work. In\naddition, empirical data collected from a control group is presented. The\nempirical data suggests that the tools are well-received, effective, and\nlearning how to use them has a low extraneous cognitive load.","PeriodicalId":501197,"journal":{"name":"arXiv - CS - Programming Languages","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0000,"publicationDate":"2024-07-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":"{\"title\":\"Finite-State Automaton To/From Regular Expression Visualization\",\"authors\":\"Marco T. MorazánSeton Hall University, Tijana MinićSeton Hall University\",\"doi\":\"arxiv-2407.08088\",\"DOIUrl\":null,\"url\":null,\"abstract\":\"Most Formal Languages and Automata Theory courses explore the duality between\\ncomputation models to recognize words in a language and computation models to\\ngenerate words in a language. For students unaccustomed to formal statements,\\nthese transformations are rarely intuitive. To assist students with such\\ntransformations, visualization tools can play a pivotal role. This article\\npresents visualization tools developed for FSM -- a domain-specific language\\nfor the Automata Theory classroom -- to transform a finite state automaton to a\\nregular expression and vice versa. Using these tools, the user may provide an\\narbitrary finite-state machine or an arbitrary regular expression and step\\nforward and step backwards through a transformation. At each step, the\\nvisualization describes the step taken. The tools are outlined, their\\nimplementation is described, and they are compared with related work. In\\naddition, empirical data collected from a control group is presented. The\\nempirical data suggests that the tools are well-received, effective, and\\nlearning how to use them has a low extraneous cognitive load.\",\"PeriodicalId\":501197,\"journal\":{\"name\":\"arXiv - CS - Programming Languages\",\"volume\":null,\"pages\":null},\"PeriodicalIF\":0.0000,\"publicationDate\":\"2024-07-10\",\"publicationTypes\":\"Journal Article\",\"fieldsOfStudy\":null,\"isOpenAccess\":false,\"openAccessPdf\":\"\",\"citationCount\":\"0\",\"resultStr\":null,\"platform\":\"Semanticscholar\",\"paperid\":null,\"PeriodicalName\":\"arXiv - CS - Programming Languages\",\"FirstCategoryId\":\"1085\",\"ListUrlMain\":\"https://doi.org/arxiv-2407.08088\",\"RegionNum\":0,\"RegionCategory\":null,\"ArticlePicture\":[],\"TitleCN\":null,\"AbstractTextCN\":null,\"PMCID\":null,\"EPubDate\":\"\",\"PubModel\":\"\",\"JCR\":\"\",\"JCRName\":\"\",\"Score\":null,\"Total\":0}","platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"arXiv - CS - Programming Languages","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/arxiv-2407.08088","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"","JCRName":"","Score":null,"Total":0}
Most Formal Languages and Automata Theory courses explore the duality between
computation models to recognize words in a language and computation models to
generate words in a language. For students unaccustomed to formal statements,
these transformations are rarely intuitive. To assist students with such
transformations, visualization tools can play a pivotal role. This article
presents visualization tools developed for FSM -- a domain-specific language
for the Automata Theory classroom -- to transform a finite state automaton to a
regular expression and vice versa. Using these tools, the user may provide an
arbitrary finite-state machine or an arbitrary regular expression and step
forward and step backwards through a transformation. At each step, the
visualization describes the step taken. The tools are outlined, their
implementation is described, and they are compared with related work. In
addition, empirical data collected from a control group is presented. The
empirical data suggests that the tools are well-received, effective, and
learning how to use them has a low extraneous cognitive load.