Making connected output/input ports visible?

[awhillas]

Is there a way to show the value/state for a node's input when it is connected for example? Your Join Text node example from the docs when two text nodes are connected to the Join Text's inputs, the text boxes disappear and you can't see what the output is doing. There is no way to see the results of these operations even if i connect a text node to it's output.
I guess this is adding some sort of visualization to the output ports, or some static text for the input when connected?
I just feel if the user can't see what is going on in a node they are going to lose confidence.