[the-alt-one]

>The goal of most IDEs seems to be first help with a debugger / executing code/tests, second help with writing code, and only thirdly help with reading code. The older I get, the more those priorities seem inverted to me.

I'd be interested in developing more tools based on abstract interpretation and symbolic execution of the programs themselves and generally be able to query your tools more.

For example, let's say that you find a program state with the debugger which is invalid, the next question is then "How can this function reach this state?". This can be answered by the symbolic execution engine, giving you a function-local path. Then you can look at the callers of this function and ask the engine to do the same resolution on that level.

Being able to formulate questions and have them answered would lead to a question/reply-driven method of working, which I think would be very helpful.