The Herald Journal

USU students to release `Bug Theatre’

By Herald Journal staff report
Published:
Saturday, July 4, 2009 4:00 AM CDT

Ask undergraduate computer scientists about their most vexing
programming challenge and they’ll sum it up in one word: bugs.
Having one typo in a line of code – maybe just a missing semicolon –
can cause the whole program to fail. Finding the problem can take
hours.
`It’s so frustrating when you know the code you’ve written should work
but it doesn’t,’ said Nare Hayrapetyan, a third-year USU Huntsman
Scholar from Armenia.
Budding programmers should have an easier time thanks to research
conducted by Hayrapetyan and fellow computer science majors Alison
Cooley and Elise Derr. The trio is working with faculty mentor Renee
Bryce to research the causes of student programming bugs and develop
learning materials to ease the obstacles.
The team plans to develop a `Bug Theatre’ program using online videos
and Web-based tutorials to identify common bugs and offer advice and
software tools to avoid them. The students have selected a movie motif
to keep the subject humorous and entertaining.
`The students have great ideas and will create movie posters and
tickets that will advertise the finished program,’ Bryce says. `Over
the course of the next year, they’ll develop online movies about bugs
that will benefit not just USU students but will be available over the
Web to users everywhere.’
Funding for the effort comes from a grant from the Computer Research
Association’s Committee on the Status of Women in Computing
Research. The award provides each of the three undergraduates a $3,000
stipend for the 2009-10 academic year, a $4,000 stipend for summer
2010, and money to attend two computer science conferences.
Computer bugs are not only a headache for students but a significant
bane for the computing industry.
`The National Institute for Standards and Technology estimates that
computer bugs cost our economy $59 billion a year,’ she says. `Bugs
are usually annoyances but they can potentially cost lives.’
Cooley, who hopes to pursue a career with the FBI, looks forward to
the research challenge and developing movies for her fellow students.
`I wish I’d had something like `Bug Theatre’ to help me out,’ she
says.