How End-User Programmers Debug Visual Web-Based Programs: An Information Foraging Theory Perspective

Abstract Web-active end-user programmers squander much of their time foraging for bugs and related information in mashup programming environments as well as on the web. To analyze this foraging behavior while debugging, we utilize an Information Foraging Theory perspective. Information Foraging Theory models the human (predator) behavior to forage for specific information (prey) in the webpages or programming IDEs (patches) by following the information features (cues) in the environment. We qualitatively studied the debugging behavior of 16 web-active end users. Our results show that end-user programmers spend substantial amounts (73%) of their time just foraging. Further, our study reveals new cue types and foraging strategies framed in terms of Information Foraging Theory, and it uncovers which of these helped end-user programmers succeed in their debugging efforts.