Google Blockly - a visual programming language • Hacker News Board

Re: Google Blockly - a visual programming language

#11

Post by arturadib » Thu, May 31, 2012, 9:57 PM UTC

Quick feedback: Would be great if the front page included some demos already built so we could have a better idea of what the final code looks like.

Re: Google Blockly - a visual programming language

#12

Post by majke » Thu, May 31, 2012, 10:02 PM UTC

This seems to be done by an extraordinarily smart guy - Neil Fraser. He's behind "google-diff-match-patch" [1] project, which is AFAIK the machinery behind realtime collaboration on google docs.

Definitely worth watching.

[1] http://code.google.com/p/google-diff-match-patch/

Re: Google Blockly - a visual programming language

#13

Post by bockris » Thu, May 31, 2012, 10:03 PM UTC

JoshTriplett wrote: post #8

grakic wrote: post #4

Can this program be made any shorter? http://www.dodaj.rs/f/1K/vW/2gLz63rl/blockly.png

An "else" would help; you can add one by hitting the + symbol on the if. With the else, you can get the shortest program that'll solve the maze (transcribing using approximate notation in lieu of a screenshot): while True: if wall(AHEAD): turn(LEFT) else: move(FORWARD) turn(RIGHT) However, the addition of one more if makes the solution much faster and look more sensible, by not turning to the right and immediately ba…

You can add an 'else' clause to the 'if' block by clicking the '+' which launches a sub-editor.

Re: Google Blockly - a visual programming language

#14

Post by poppysan » Thu, May 31, 2012, 10:03 PM UTC

grakic wrote: post #4

Can this program be made any shorter? http://www.dodaj.rs/f/1K/vW/2gLz63rl/blockly.png

http://i.imgur.com/8D2G9.jpg

Re: Google Blockly - a visual programming language

#15

Post by ArekDymalski » Thu, May 31, 2012, 10:07 PM UTC

I don't understand. 1st it was part of AppInventor lab experiment. Google closed it in December and MIT took it over. Now it's back? Why?

Re: Google Blockly - a visual programming language

#16

Post by nilliams » Thu, May 31, 2012, 10:07 PM UTC

trun wrote: post #7

dangrover wrote: post #2

The UI for this reminds me a lot of Scratch from MIT.

Indeed. I wrote a similar framework in Actionscript / Flex a few years ago, actually with a lot of input from the Scratch team. I've been thinking about porting it to JS recently. Glad to see someone beat me to it :) Edit: Here's my old Actionscript library in case anyone is interested. https://github.com/trun/flashblocks

Yep, actually someone else (Dethe Elza) already beat you to a JS version: http://waterbearlang.com/garden.html?plugin=canvas

It was presented at JSConf last year: http://blip.tv/jsconf/jsconf2011-dethe-elza-5942746

Re: Google Blockly - a visual programming language

#17

Post by jules » Thu, May 31, 2012, 10:10 PM UTC

grakic wrote: post #4

Can this program be made any shorter? http://www.dodaj.rs/f/1K/vW/2gLz63rl/blockly.png

http://i.imgur.com/HTvOx.png

Edit: I didn't know that an else was possible, so I had to do it this way.

Re: Google Blockly - a visual programming language

#18

Post by cnlwsu » Thu, May 31, 2012, 10:15 PM UTC

grakic wrote: post #4

Can this program be made any shorter? http://www.dodaj.rs/f/1K/vW/2gLz63rl/blockly.png

takes awhile... hard to tell whats "shorter"

  while !wall(AHEAD):
    move forward
    turn left
    while wall(AHEAD):
      turn right

Re: Google Blockly - a visual programming language

#19

Post by radarsat1 » Thu, May 31, 2012, 10:15 PM UTC

grakic wrote: post #4

Can this program be made any shorter? http://www.dodaj.rs/f/1K/vW/2gLz63rl/blockly.png

Weird, that looks like you're manipulating blocks of text with the mouse. How is that a "visual programming language"? It just seems to be a fancy text editor.

Re: Google Blockly - a visual programming language

#20

Post by eigenbom » Thu, May 31, 2012, 10:25 PM UTC

radarsat1 wrote: post #19

grakic wrote: post #4

Can this program be made any shorter? http://www.dodaj.rs/f/1K/vW/2gLz63rl/blockly.png

Weird, that looks like you're manipulating blocks of text with the mouse. How is that a "visual programming language"? It just seems to be a fancy text editor.

It visually represents the grammar of the language with the jigsaw patterns of the keywords, and prohibits connecting bad sequences, etc.