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Mozilla Thimble

thimble.webmaker.org

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Re: Mozilla Thimble

#41

Post by sixbrx »

vibrunazo wrote: post #5

This feels like they're a bit confused about which target audience and abstraction layer they're aiming to. This is like trying to get more kids to program by trying to show them how easy and fun assembly language is. Shouldn't your energy be better spent developing, promoting and educating the use of higher level tools? It's hard for me to think of an use case for this. What kind of people, exactly would this help?…

You know, I waited too long for the right higher level layer or even outright replacement for html/javascript to come along and rise in popularity. Now I wish I'd just dived in to plain html/javascript earlier and become adept with them just as they were. A lot of "higher level" layers have come and gone, while javascript and html are still with us, and getting stronger all the time. What's more even with a higher level layer above them, you're going to have to know them anyway, to use them in real projects.

Re: Mozilla Thimble

#42

Post by toddmorey »

sequoia wrote: post #11

To developers complaining that this is not an IDE they'd actually use: where did you get the idea that this tool is meant to be an IDE for professionals? This is clearly an educational tool, and I think it looks pretty good for that. 0. pick text editor 1. install text editor 2. find some sample html 3. open file in your browser 4. find some resources for learning HTML & CSS (yep, w3schools) 5. learn that validators…

They are being hurt by their own branding. It shouldn't be positioned as a way to create web pages, just like Code Academy isn't positioned as a way to create javascript. They are both ways to learn with instant feedback and solid instructions. (The instructions are in the app for Code Academy and in the HTML comments for Thimble.)

Re: Mozilla Thimble

#46

Post by roryokane »

munchor wrote: post #18

The first thing I noticed was that the font of the editor is not monospaced... too bad.

I like the proportional font better, anyway. It's still plenty easy enough to notice the punctuation, and this way, the words look nicer. And there are plenty of words - each project has lots of comments and sample text.

Re: Mozilla Thimble

#47

Post by zobzu »

toddmorey wrote: post #42
sequoia wrote: post #11

To developers complaining that this is not an IDE they'd actually use: where did you get the idea that this tool is meant to be an IDE for professionals? This is clearly an educational tool, and I think it looks pretty good for that. 0. pick text editor 1. install text editor 2. find some sample html 3. open file in your browser 4. find some resources for learning HTML & CSS (yep, w3schools) 5. learn that validators…

They are being hurt by their own branding. It shouldn't be positioned as a way to create web pages, just like Code Academy isn't positioned as a way to create javascript. They are both ways to learn with instant feedback and solid instructions. (The instructions are in the app for Code Academy and in the HTML comments for Thimble.)

For non-tech users it is a tool to create web pages, though. They will go to that more easily.

For the tech users they know it's not an IDE and not meant to be. Anyone claiming the opposite is a troll/likes to bash Mozilla (cause it's trendy in case you haven't noticed) and so on.

And in case you dare to argue my point: if you're talking about an IDE guess what? Well, you already did. You're a tech user.

Re: Mozilla Thimble

#48

Post by zanny »

daa wrote: post #37
danab wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even though I also enjoy not closing my li's, I don't think this is an egregious error. The app appears to be focused on helping novices interested in learning HTML. To those just beginning, it's probably most important to enforce the idea of most elements having opening and closing tags. However, if their target audience is actual developers...well, they've got lots of other problems to deal with as well.

The target audience is very much _NOT_ real developers. Think of it as "lesson 2", where "lesson 1" is something like x-ray goggles: https://webmaker.org/en-US/tools/x-ray-goggles/ for someone who _knows nothing_ to start with. Your average (not geeky) 12-year old or 70-year old, for example.

I'm a computer science graduate (aka, I hope I'm a geek) who did the whole html / css track at Code Academy in about 3 hours (aka, hopefully I'm past lesson 0, I haven't taken any web dev classes or some such ever) but trying to keep all the possible tags in my brain at once is still hard. I feel like this kind of tool does nothing if the newbie doesn't know the tags to match the ideas they have for the page.

Re: Mozilla Thimble

#49

Post by scotty79 »

Horrible. No code completion. No separation of css and js. I pretended I don't know anything and got to the point where I had no idea what to do next pretty quick and zoned out.
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