https://www.inkandswitch.com/end-user-programming/

Today’s software apps are like appliances: we can only use the capabilities exactly as programmed by the developer. What if we, and all computer users, could reach in and modify our favorite apps? Or even create new apps on the fly according to our needs in the moment?

This is end-user programming, a vision for empowered computing pursued by bright-eyed computer science visionaries.

But despite forty years of commercial products, open source, and deep academic work, we have yet to reach an end-user programming utopia. In fact, the opposite: today our computing devices are less programmable and less customizable than ever before.

At Ink & Switch, we believe that software should be extensible in an easy, everyday manner. We believe users want to automate, customize, or even make their own tools without much ceremony. History offers us some great examples.