Exploiting Runtime Information in the IDE

Developers rely on the mechanisms provided by their IDE to browse and navigate a large software system. These mechanisms are usually based purely on a system's static source code. The static perspective, however, is not enough to understand an object-oriented program's behavior, in particular if implemented in a dynamic language. The authors propose to enhance IDEs with a program's run-time information (e.g., message sends and type information) to support program comprehension through precise navigation and informative browsing. To precisely specify the type and amount of run-time data to gather about a system under development, dynamically and on demand, they adopt a technique known as partial behavioral reflection.