Volume 7
Volume 7, Number 10 |
March 20, 2009 |
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Mariano Martínez
Rosana Barbuzza
María Virginia Mauco
Liliana Favre
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Abstract: There is a need to introduce Information Systems students to advances in languages and automata theory in the early stages of their formation. Visualization and interactivity allow students to play an active role in the learning process, experimenting with the concepts to receive feedback. For this purpose, we propose MTSolution, an educational, visual and interactive software tool that allows teachers and students to experiment with different kinds of abstract models (automata, grammars and regular expressions). With this tool, students can improve their understanding and self-evaluate their own skills designing and testing models. In particular, MTSolution supports the concept of sub-machine providing a library of Turing machines that can be reused in modular designs. MTSolution is based on a client-server architecture and it is implemented in Microsoft Visual C++.NET.
Keywords: Software tool, Automata, Turing Machine, Grammars, Formal Languages
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Recommended Citation: Martínez, Barbuzza, Mauco, and Favre (2009). MTSolution: A Visual and Interactive Tool for a Formal Languages and Automata Course. Information Systems Education Journal, 7 (10). http://isedj.org/7/10/. ISSN: 1545-679X. (A preliminary version appears in The Proceedings of ISECON 2007: §3722. ISSN: 1542-7382.)
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