What if end users own the software development process from conception to maintenance using only requirements expressed in language, images, video or audio?

We explore this idea, building on the capabilities generative AI brings to software engineering.

How could designing software in this way better serve end users?

What are the implications for the future of end-user programming?

We will survey current progress and open research questions in this exciting new area of programming language research.

Based on joint work with Diana Robinson, Christian Cabrera, Neil Lawrence, and Lars Mennen.

Andy Gordon is a computer scientist specializing in programming languages, AI, and human-computer interaction, with a special interest in spreadsheets. After 26 years at Microsoft, Andy is now Chief Science Officer at software synthesis company Cogna. As Partner Research Manager at Microsoft Research, Andy led a diverse team of researchers and engineers to evolve Microsoft Excel as an end-user programming language. Impact includes natural language formulas using generative AI in Copilot for Excel, the Calc.ts client-side execution engine for Excel formulas, Excel Labs, and formula features like LET/LAMBDA. Andy was recognised as a 2020 Fellow of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) for his research on programming languages: principles, logic, usability, and trustworthiness. As an academic, Andy is now Honorary Professor at the University of Edinburgh, following 12 years as full Professor. His PhD research at Cambridge contributed to the design of monadic I/O in Haskell, with his ASCII art “>>=” inspiring the Haskell logo.