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Xiki: The Command Revolution

kickstarter.com

31–40 of 49 posts

Re: Xiki: The Command Revolution

#32
Looks cool.

I am slightly concerned when it comes to security and "noobs" pasting commands without getting stuff.

Think rm -f ~/

Would be great for stuff that is to unique(only happens once ever) to write automated bash scripts for. The problem is that one might not know that in advance, and suddenly one has to scripify it for real.

Re: Xiki: The Command Revolution

#34
post #25

I'll plant my lawn sign to lobby for support. I think this is such a completely new way of running a shell it's worth investing in to see how far it can get. Maybe I am a computing retrofuturist, but I like anything that pushes towards a Plan 9 / Smalltalk / Jef Raskin like dynamic, configurable, adaptable, programmable, textual user interface. Also, recognition is always better than recall. I hate the UNIXy command…

Thanks so much sunir! I love the unixy command line. I think there's a path to bringing command line haters and lovers together, to get us all creating and sharing commands that we can use with our UI method of choice.

Re: Xiki: The Command Revolution

#35

Hey! Project creator here! I'll answer all your questions here and try and clear up the writing. Ask away.

Some things that are unclear: 1. on kickstarter page: "getting Xiki working in other text editors, like Sublime and Vim." on github: "It has a web interface, but runs best from a Xiki-enabled text editor" What is a Xiki-enabled text-editor, i.e. what text editors does it support currently? (FWIW I don't like web-based editors, so it is quite important that the text editor is a real application. I edit blogposts/wikip…

1. Currently supports Aquamacs and Emacs. "Xiki-enabled text editor" means a text editor with a Xiki plugin installed. Which, in turn, means you can run Xiki commands right from that text editor (or IDE).

2. Yes, you need to be careful. Similar to being careful to which commands you paste into your shell, and which .sh files and scripts you run and which packages you install. It won't auto-run anything though. And since everything is plaintext, it should help people to review for malicious intent. Maybe some checking for special characters would be a good feature to add.

3. There's no way to preview. If you don't know what a command will probably do and don't trust the source, you probably shouldn't run it. There is a keyboard shortcut for jumping to the source code though!

4. Yes, you can run as non-root. The current version is a bit out of date, and has a rough install process (the Kickstarter is all about improving that). Currently you need ruby 1.9. I need to fix that soon - it probably won't be hard.

5. Ruby is a pretty decent language for manipulating text, and getting stuff done quickly, so it's a good fit for Xiki. You can make a Xiki command via a .py, .js, or .coffee file though, so you don't need to know ruby to make commands!

Re: Xiki: The Command Revolution

#37
post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seconded. It's like you're telling me, "we don't believe in our product so have some cheesy music to up the hype". Music was worst part. I was trying to ponder your invention and failed. Corollary: spend years working on product, ruin it with one stupid customer-facing decision like annoying music. Talk about your one-percenter.

Sorry you don't like the music. I showed it to a bunch of people and they said good things about the music. The music was actually created via the xiki "piano" command (and then enhanced with garage band). I was going to emphasize that but ran out of time... There are 16 backers so far (and only a few are friends) so hopefully it hasn't ruined it for everyone.

The music was fine, not that big a deal. Altogether the video didn't blow my mind like the short screencast on xiki.org did, but that may be because my mind was already blown.

Re: Xiki: The Command Revolution

#38

Am I the only one here that really liked the video and the concept of Xiki in general? I thought it looked really interesting and I'm going to try it out tonight on my laptop.

I've been psyched about this project since it was brought up a month or two ago in a discussion about tree viewers here on HN. Its pretty compelling, even if it may not integrate well into developers' workflows. Now I've just got to find time to start using it...

Re: Xiki: The Command Revolution

#39
post #28

Is it supports SSH and curses applications (e.g. vim)? I didn't see it in the videos.

There's an experimental web interface that's part of the project. I imagine that an ncurses interface could be built on top of the xiki API in some fashion, although I don't think that is really a use case that the creator has envisioned per se.

Re: Xiki: The Command Revolution

#40
Backed.

There's some negativity floating around here with regards to the video, but I'm glad I watched it before reading the comments. The video clearly shows what Craig has in mind for this tool, and the music gives some character too. Best of luck with this campaign!

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