  Software development of modern, data-driven applications still relies on
tools that use interaction paradigms that have remained mostly unchanged for
decades. While rich forms of interactions exist as an alternative to textual
command input, they find little adoption in professional software creation. In
this work, we compare graphical programming using direct manipulation to the
traditional, textual way of creating data-driven applications to determine the
benefits and drawbacks of each. In a between-subjects user study (N=18), we
compared developing a machine learning architecture with a graphical editor to
traditional code-based development. While qualitative and quantitative measures
show general benefits of graphical direct manipulation, the user's subjective
perception does not always match this. Participants were aware of the possible
benefits of such tools but were still biased in their perception. Our findings
highlight that alternative software creation tools cannot just rely on good
usability but must emphasize the demands of their specific target group, e.g.
user control and flexibility, if they want long-term benefits and adoption.

Human-Computer Interaction