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Why can't I write code inside my browser?

tomcritchlow.com

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Re: Why can't I write code inside my browser?

#301

Post by swiftcoder »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #225
swiftcoder wrote: post #142

A lot of dunking of the "git gud" variety going on here, but the author has a solid point. Requiring a novice to learn arcana of a 30 year old Unix system before they can learn to program is purely extraneous. We could package programming languages up with GUI installers that set everything up correctly and let you get right to the code - and in fact, we used to. If you install IntelliJ, you'll have a fully-working J…

The problem is that without understanding the "arcana" of the OS platform you're using, you'll quickly hit a brick wall with your IDE. You won't understand what the configuration options mean, you won't understand what the documentation or people on StackOverflow want you to do and why . IDEs are mostly an abstraction over a set of CLI tools; if you try to do anything nontrivial, you'll see where the abstraction leak…

This is true of quite a few of the kludgy build-an-IDE-out-of-plugins environments popular in the open-source world (Atom, VS Code, Vim-as-IDE, etc), but that's precisely the problem I'm getting at.

It doesn't tend to be true of mature IDE-first environments (see the aforementioned Visual Studio or IntelliJ).

Re: Why can't I write code inside my browser?

#302

Post by [deleted] »

bregma wrote: post #245
malux85 wrote: post #88

If the author has “been playing with the web and code for years” and is still “wtf” on /usr/local/bin in $PATH it shows a lack of discipline and structure in their learning. I see this in many in many of my apprentices - the desire for instant gratification and the lack of experience means they refuse to do anything that doesn’t immediately proceed them closer to their goal. Here’s the thing with programming - you ca…

> Stop trying to assemble a fully functional car with no understanding of the fundamentals and then getting frustrated that car assembly is difficult. Most of these people find driving hard. You have to put the liquid in the hole and turn the key and keep pressing the floor-thing and hold the circle thing all while looking out the window to make sure no one gets in your way and the car stays on the hard paths. What t…

[deleted]

Re: Why can't I write code inside my browser?

#303

Post by oneweekwonder »

z3t4 wrote: post #54

https://nwjs.io/ - A browser with built in Node.js. Or editors/IDE inside the browser: https://webide.se/ https://codeanywhere.com/ https://aws.amazon.com/cloud9/

adding to the editors/IDE inside the browser:

https://github.com/cdr/code-server (headless vscode) https://github.com/pylonide/pylon (fork of c9v2 when it was still open source)

Re: Why can't I write code inside my browser?

#304

Post by lionkor »

user-the-name wrote: post #260
lionkor wrote: post #241

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What programming projects have you completed in the last 10 years?

Too many to list. Currently working as a senior programmer for the user-facing client for a company worth hundreds of millions, with an app store rating of 4.9. Previously, I've developed open source software that got 5000-10000 downloads a day, and a few private commercial projects that pulled in a few thousand dollars a month. A recent open source project on github has 8k stars. Is that enough credentials to listen…

It's enough credentials to make your criticisms worth thinking about. It's fascinating how, in a few years, I got so familiar with the commandline and never felt like it was too complicated (although I do almost everything through it), both at work and privately.

Maybe, with a skillset like that, you could just make the things better that you dont like, instead of what looks like "just complaining".

Re: Why can't I write code inside my browser?

#305

Post by swiftcoder »

ttt0 wrote: post #238
swiftcoder wrote: post #142

A lot of dunking of the "git gud" variety going on here, but the author has a solid point. Requiring a novice to learn arcana of a 30 year old Unix system before they can learn to program is purely extraneous. We could package programming languages up with GUI installers that set everything up correctly and let you get right to the code - and in fact, we used to. If you install IntelliJ, you'll have a fully-working J…

What arcana? Windows is not Unix and it uses PATH variable too. On most Linux distros you can simply run the equivalent to `sudo apt-get install nodejs` (or use a graphical front-end, if that's too hard for you) and everything will just work. Just as an aside, GUI installers are an absolute cancer. I don't mind if there is an option to do that, but I just wish I could make a simple script for installing all the neces…

> What arcana? Windows is not Unix and it uses PATH variable too.

That's a whole additional world of arcana, since the Windows PATH variable works subtly differently, and is configured through a (fairly obtuse) GUI in an unrelated settings panel.

> On most Linux distros you can simply run the equivalent to `sudo apt-get install nodejs`

The OP is however on a Mac, where there isn't a default package manager. Now suddenly novices have to go learn about the differences between Homebrew vs MacPorts, and why neither one works properly on their shiny new MacBook.

> Just as an aside, GUI installers are an absolute cancer

For us linux sysadmins? Sure. For the rest of the world GUI installers are just how computers work.

Re: Why can't I write code inside my browser?

#306

Post by gorpomon »

To anyone confused by $PATH, read "Unix for the beginning mage":

https://lab46.g7n.org/_media/haas/ufbm.pdf

I've taught at several bootcamps, and this is the first book I tell everyone to read. I tell my students to just get it read ASAP. After that setting up your environments or $PATH becomes much more comprehensible. Git becomes much more comprehensible. Life as a developer is much more pleasant.

The article author should take time to understand the command line environment they work in, simple as that. I've had the exact same struggles the author has had. I've had Ruby, JS and npm implosions, multiple times. It would be nice if the languages and tools documented their errors better. All tools should strive for better, more beginner friendly documentation. But if you're a dev right now knowing Unix has to be table stakes.

Re: Why can't I write code inside my browser?

#307

Post by throwaway2245 »

kichimi wrote: post #96

I try to keep my comments nice on HN but in this case I can't, I've met this kind of person many times now and I just can't hold back. The author is lazy, and is channeling his energy into complaining rather than learning. He believes he is by default an expert on the 'user friendliness' of programming. His comments don't really make much sense, and come across as whining that should be ignored. "People hate command…

> "People hate command lines - not only do they LOOK scary, they give weird unhelpful error messages and… you have to type everything. Ugh. "... I have no patience any more for lazy know it alls

I would guess that almost everyone who has ever learned programming has gone through this experience, been frustrated, and understood in the moment that this was bad UX that could be improved for learners. As such, your attitude, and lack of empathy, seems like gate-keeping to me.

You have been treated poorly and accepted it, so other people must be treated poorly and accept it, in order to prove themselves. This only perpetuates bad practices.

I would say that you are the lazy one, in not wanting to support other people in their programming journeys.

Re: Why can't I write code inside my browser?

#308

Post by imtringued »

user-the-name wrote: post #104
kichimi wrote: post #96

I try to keep my comments nice on HN but in this case I can't, I've met this kind of person many times now and I just can't hold back. The author is lazy, and is channeling his energy into complaining rather than learning. He believes he is by default an expert on the 'user friendliness' of programming. His comments don't really make much sense, and come across as whining that should be ignored. "People hate command…

The author is 100% correct on everything. Programming is massively over-complicated for no useful reason. Programmers tend to get very proud of the completely pointless knowledge they have to acquire to use the pointlessly complicated tools they do, and they confuse that with being clever. It's not. It's really not. Nothing has to be this esoteric and annoying. We've just chosen to keep things like this because we th…

>Programmers tend to get very proud of the completely pointless knowledge they have to acquire to use the pointlessly complicated tools they do, and they confuse that with being clever.

You need that knowledge to build production level applications. The problem is not that these tools are useless, but rather that the audience you are thinking of doesn't care about them. Instead of crapping on other's people's work just look for things that are actually suitable for your own needs instead of trying to one up the experts.

>It's not. It's really not. Nothing has to be this esoteric and annoying. We've just chosen to keep things like this because we think it makes us clever.

I'll be honest. I don't like people like you. You are making things harder for yourself. You have chosen to go down a difficult path and then you complain that the experts that need these difficult tools are stupid.

Why? There are lots of easy to learn programming languages. You can start off with a very limited and restricted environment. Just fire up a google spreadsheet and start writing javascript if that is all you want. Don't complain that writing a production level web application is difficult because you need to know about complicated things like what a HTTP server is and why it has to run on port xyz and why everyone calls their own computer localhost.

>Programming can and should be much, much more user friendly than it is now.

It is so user friendly even kids can pick it up if their game supports modding. You're not looking hard enough. If someone were to hand you everything on a silver platter you would never learn on your own.

Re: Why can't I write code inside my browser?

#309

Post by twobitshifter »

robenkleene wrote: post #180

The reason you can't do this is that Node of course has a bunch of file system APIs that for security reasons necessitate an application designed for automatically downloading and executing arbitrary source code can never, ever, have access to. But you could rephrase the authors point this way: Browsers make a ton of concessions to regular users at the expense of developers. Consider for example that the act of devel…

Are you aware of Firefox Developer Edition? https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/developer/

Re: Why can't I write code inside my browser?

#310

Post by malux85 »

user-the-name wrote: post #291
malux85 wrote: post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When I was travelling through Italy, I learnt a phrase from programmers there, "If my mother had wheels, she would have been a bike" - and it's a criticism of hypothetical situations like your answer above. Saying "This is arbitrary if we made a different choice things would be different" is a total meaningless statement because you just move the bar and then say if the bar is moved things are different. My argument…

What I am saying is, as soon as someone new to programming points out, entirely correctly, that the tools we use are weird, obscure and difficult to use for no apparent reason, programmers will scream in rage that no, they are not, and by the way, you are stupid for saying it, you clearly have no idea what you are doing and you will never be a programmer. As is happening everywhere in this very thread. I am saying th…

> programmers will scream in rage that no, they are not, and by the way, you are stupid for saying it, you clearly have no idea what you are doing and you will never be a programmer.

Nobody has said this to you in this thread, and the fact that you're acting like it is the only toxic thing here. This is called a straw-man logical fallacy, you misrepresent my argument so it makes it easier for you to attack. Nobody has said this to you, that part is all in your head.

I'm saying the tools are not weird if you understand them, and how they fit as a cohesive whole. I'm saying they just look weird to you, because you don't yet understand them. Can we do better? Absolutely, I'm all for better tools. But if the original poster wants to install pip and ruby and nodejs then knowledge of system paths is mandatory - because this is what they are trying to do.

In my answers above, I have named several programming languages, several operating systems, discussed my commercial experience and then talked about the rationale behind my logic.

You have done nothing but turn these into personal attacks against yourself, not discussing systems or operating systems, (not even naming one!) but always complaining about people calling you stupid or how you're the victim. The only person that has used the word stupid in this thread is you. You are a toxic narcissist, and I chose not to engage with you.

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