I'm not sure what Bret Victor had in mind, but the second part of Skiena's text The Algorithm Design Manual already does a good job at this. Similar write ups are available online [0], in less detail than the text, e.g. [1]. They all open with a pictorial representation of possible input and corresponding output to aid in scanning when you have a problem to solve. There is also the Encyclopedia of Algorithms [2], and the NIST Dictionary of Algorithms and Data Structures [3], history of at [4].