Meaningful names for variables and functions/procedures help people better understand programs. Longer code blocks are harder to reason about than shorter code blocks in a program.
Locating and correcting errors in a program is called debugging the program. Knowledge of what a program is supposed to do is required in order to find most program errors. Examples of intended behavior on specific inputs help people understand what a program is supposed to do. Visual displays (or different modalities) of program state can help in finding errors.
As part of the programming process, programmers justify and explain a program’s correctness. Justification can include a written explanation about how a program meets its specifications. Correctness of a program depends on correctness of program components, including code blocks and procedures. An explanation of a program helps people understand the functionality and purpose of a program. The functionality of a program is often described by how a user interacts with the program. The functionality of a program is best described at a high level by what the program does, not at a lower level of how the program statements work to accomplish this.
