NES: An Instruction-Free, Low-Latency Next Edit Suggestion Framework Powered by Learned Historical Editing Trajectories

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Authors: Xinfang Chen, Siyang Xiao, Xianying Zhu, Junfa Xie, Ming Liang, Dajun Chen, Wei Jiang, Yong Li, Peng Di
Cited by: 0
References: 57

Abstract

Code editing is a frequent yet cognitively demanding task in software development. Existing AI-powered tools often disrupt developer flow by requiring explicit natural language instructions and suffer from high latency, limiting real-world usability. We present NES (Next Edit Suggestion), an instruction-free, low-latency code editing framework that leverages learned historical editing trajectories to implicitly capture developers' goals and coding habits. NES features a dual-model architecture: one model predicts the next edit location and the other generates the precise code change, both without any user instruction. Trained on our open-sourced SFT and DAPO datasets, NES achieves state-of-the-art performance (75.6% location accuracy, 27.7% exact match rate) while delivering suggestions in under 250ms. Deployed at Ant Group, NES serves over 20,000 developers through a seamless Tab-key interaction, achieving effective acceptance rates of 51.55% for location predictions and 43.44% for edits, demonstrating its practical impact in real-world development workflows.

Fields of Study & Subjects

Software Engineering Research Software Testing and Debugging Techniques Scientific Computing and Data Management

Publication details

Journal / source
Proceedings of the 34th ACM International Conference on the Foundations of Software Engineering
Publisher
ACM
Pages
719–730
Publication date
5 July 2026
Language
EN