This is awesome. Can't wait to try it. I feel like this is how I work with code already but in a much more cumbersome way. My only wish was that it felt more like a JetBrains IDE and less like VS Code, but that's just personal preference!
Show HN: Haystack – an IDE for exploring and editing code on an infinite canvas
111–120 of 227 posts
Re: Show HN: Haystack – an IDE for exploring and editing code on an infinite canvas
#112This looks really interesting and well thought out. Nonetheless, I feel like the OS window manager should provide this kind of experience, with appropriate hooks so that an IDE can implement this sort of experience with native windows.
I really liked using PaperWM¹ for a while, however, I'm still waiting for it to get more stable.
Another system that is sort of similar to this concept, Pipeworld² (part of the Arcan project) is an impressive research UI experiment which is a bit too far out for my daily use.
1. https://github.com/paperwm/PaperWM?tab=readme-ov-file#paperw... 2. https://arcan-fe.com/2021/04/12/introducing-pipeworld/
Re: Show HN: Haystack – an IDE for exploring and editing code on an infinite canvas
#113Looks pretty interesting. A Figma style zoom in and out could help give you the big overview. I always get lost in the gazillions of tabs in IDEs. Stuff like this allows people to use their spatial memory, which is underutilized in a lot of tools.
Re: Show HN: Haystack – an IDE for exploring and editing code on an infinite canvas
#114Looks pretty interesting. A Figma style zoom in and out could help give you the big overview. I always get lost in the gazillions of tabs in IDEs. Stuff like this allows people to use their spatial memory, which is underutilized in a lot of tools.
I hardly ever navigate by clicking on a tab. I use keyboard shortcuts to navigate by filename, symbol, etc... Might be worth a try if you're getting lost in tabs, your IDE probably supports it.
Re: Show HN: Haystack – an IDE for exploring and editing code on an infinite canvas
#115This looks really interesting and well thought out. Nonetheless, I feel like the OS window manager should provide this kind of experience, with appropriate hooks so that an IDE can implement this sort of experience with native windows. I really liked using PaperWM¹ for a while, however, I'm still waiting for it to get more stable. Another system that is sort of similar to this concept, Pipeworld² (part of the Arcan p…
OS windows are a hindrance for any workflow needing semi-permanent layout. It's ok to place two or three monolithic apps side by side, and maybe to pull apart separate working sessions at different virtual spaces. It also requires constant bookkeping to clean up all the individual windows you no longer need.
That's very different from a spatial layout, where you can juxtapose related code elements near each other, and they remain in those places for as long as you're using them, and then get rid of all them together by closing their common container.
There have been attempts to create new, more spatial work styles on window managers, but the industry is too set in their ways on how windows should be managed, and WMs are complex beasts with many moving parts. So it's usually better to keep those experimental tools self-contained within their own window or app.
Re: Show HN: Haystack – an IDE for exploring and editing code on an infinite canvas
#116This is really nice - there is something about the whole concept that feels smooth in comparison to switching tabs.
Re: Show HN: Haystack – an IDE for exploring and editing code on an infinite canvas
#117Is it partly inspired by Smalltalk browsers?
Yes, that was my first thought too. The concept is similar.
Get rid if the source-files and put every function/method in its own "editor". However, as far as I remember navigation to/from callers was not possible in Smalltalk.
Re: Show HN: Haystack – an IDE for exploring and editing code on an infinite canvas
#118Looks pretty interesting. Although I have been a Java developer and has a preference for Eclipse, would like to see if this can ease out some parts of development for me.
Re: Show HN: Haystack – an IDE for exploring and editing code on an infinite canvas
#119There was CodeRibbon for Atom to navigate the code you work on: https://coderibbon.github.io/CodeRibbon/
How do you feel about that view of navigation?