8 ms·

Show HN: An Easy Programming Language – Built with WebAssembly

144 points by chkas 8y ago

codetrotter 8y ago
Pretty cool! Is the source on GitHub? If not, do you plan to put it there under an open source license?
- chkas 8y ago
  Not yet - I intend it when it reaches a certain spread - I don't want anyone to change that a little and then claim it as his work.
  - yorwba 8y ago
    I wonder why you think someone else copying your work is a risk. I'm aware that some people stuff their GitHub profiles by forking projects and rewriting the author information, but I don't think that influences the original project's reputation in any way.
  - ModernMech 8y ago
    This is literally not a concern. There's a very large community of hobbyist programming language designers and I've never heard an instance of someone poaching another's language and running with it as their own.
    - maxhallinan 8y ago
      Where does this community of hobbyist language designers gather online?
      - ModernMech 8y ago
        /r/programminglanguages (17.5k subscribers) is a good start. They recently launched a directory of projects (50+) the group is working on: https://www.proglangdesign.net https://www.proglangdesign.net which also links to their IRC and discord servers. Also there's https://futureofcoding.org https://futureofcoding.org which has a growing community of language and tool designers focused on live-coding languages. There's a good number of projects being developed by members there.
        maxhallinan 8y ago
        Thanks!
  - csomar 8y ago
    I honest think the probability of that is quite close to 0.
  - O1111OOO 8y ago
    > I intend it when it reaches a certain spread - I don't want anyone to change that a little It's a good decision. You've created an easy to follow programming language, built a wonderful interface, provided excellent instructions. People often forget that the essence of the code (the spirit of that code) is driven by the vision (and passion) of a single individual. Sometimes (but rarely) more than one person shares this vision. I have literally seen 100s of programming languages on HN and quite frankly, they are mostly copy/paste of existing languages built around the same mindset of others - providing no real advantages to their target audience. The target audience for https://easyprog.online/ide/ https://easyprog.online/ide/ is different. The cost of entry (in the manner you have built this) is much smaller than other options for beginning coders. You've done a nice job with this! I very much like that you wish to continue to control the direction until it can establish itself in some way.
Vanderson 8y ago
The syntax/formatting reminds me of Lingo [0]. But also Logo and Basic. One of the things I really liked about coding in Lingo (in Director [1]) was the sparse syntax but the code auto-highlighted as you typed. (not common back then) But also auto indented as you typed. It was really easy and fast to program with. The graphics code reminded me of "hi-res" graphics programming on the Apple computer. Some nostalgia there. This brings me around to how magical it felt to program things for the first time as a kid, and how there doesn't seem to be an environment for this kind of excitement or discovery anymore. Maybe just a change of times, like how the first planes and auto-mobiles were created by hobbyists, but those times are mostly gone. Any notion on what a language like this would be good for? I get the impression maybe similar to my own nostalgia... [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lingo_(programming_language) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lingo_(programming_language) [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adobe_Director https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adobe_Director
- chkas 8y ago
  > Any notion on what a language like this would be good for? I get the impression maybe similar to my own nostalgia... I agree with you - learning programming was more fun in the past. It can be used as a first text-oriented learning language. I also like to use it myself to write simple games. https://easyprog.online/games/ https://easyprog.online/games/
  - irq-1 8y ago
    The automatic formatting was nice, but I found a few times where I seemingly couldn't type; the formatter would just reset and ignore the key. For example I had "exit .." and couldn't hit enter to put the dots on the next line. New people probably won't understand why they can't press enter.
    - chkas 8y ago
      Thank you for pointing that out. When you press Enter, everything is parsed, including the current line. The current line will only be accepted if it is syntactically correct. Normally this works quite well, but for beginners this can be a real problem. With "Ctrl-R" you can see the error. I need to think about how to improve this.
AnaniasAnanas 8y ago
All I see is "Loading ..." and when looking at the console I see things like "Content Security Policy: The page’s settings blocked the loading of a resource at https://easyprog.online/games/easyw.js https://easyprog.online/games/easyw.js (“worker-src”).".
desireco42 8y ago
I like it, it is very well made and organized. I jumped to Monte Carlo methods and examples clearly explained what it was. I think this is great layout for teaching. Thank you for making it.
mrspeaker 8y ago
I really like this. Could you make the page load with the first demo code pre-loaded? I sat there looking at the code and hitting "run", checking the browser console to see if there was any error. Then I realised I had to press "load" first and then "run". Also, one bit of criticism: if it's not too late I'd also re-think the name. "Easyprog" is going to make any newbies really frustrated when they can't figure something out and the site is just mocking them: "lol, you can't figure it out and it's so EASY!". Other than that, I think this is a great project - really well done, and it has a lot of potential to me really great learning tool.
- chkas 8y ago
  Thank you for your feedback. I think I'll disable the run button if there's no code.
- chkas 8y ago
  > if it's not too late I'd also re-think the name I am also not yet satisfied with the name - so if you had a suggestion ...
mwexler 8y ago
Evokes logo/pilot with turtle graphics; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PILOT https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PILOT and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logo_(programming_language) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logo_(programming_language) which were both great fun back in the day...
amenghra 8y ago
a = 11 if a = 10 Great way to set someone up for failure when they switch to any C-like language! I personally have experienced people finding it easier to grasp a construct such as a := 1 or let a = 1. The way most programming languages assign values to variables conflicts with the notion of equations, which is familiar to a lot of people by the time they learn to write programs.
- musicale 8y ago
  Perhaps it's C that is weird for confusingly allowing you to assign within a logical expression. At least clang (and possibly other compilers) warn you because they assume you meant to write '=='. (Dartmouth BASIC required a LET keyword, Kemeny and Kurtz being mathematicians after all. Bill Gates might have made it optional in Microsoft BASIC to save typing and possibly one byte of memory.) I sort of miss Smalltalk's left-arrow though.

144 points by chkas 8y ago

codetrotter 8y ago

Pretty cool! Is the source on GitHub? If not, do you plan to put it there under an open source license?

chkas 8y ago
Not yet - I intend it when it reaches a certain spread - I don't want anyone to change that a little and then claim it as his work.
- yorwba 8y ago
  I wonder why you think someone else copying your work is a risk. I'm aware that some people stuff their GitHub profiles by forking projects and rewriting the author information, but I don't think that influences the original project's reputation in any way.
- ModernMech 8y ago
  This is literally not a concern. There's a very large community of hobbyist programming language designers and I've never heard an instance of someone poaching another's language and running with it as their own.
  - maxhallinan 8y ago
    Where does this community of hobbyist language designers gather online?
    - ModernMech 8y ago
      /r/programminglanguages (17.5k subscribers) is a good start. They recently launched a directory of projects (50+) the group is working on: https://www.proglangdesign.net https://www.proglangdesign.net which also links to their IRC and discord servers. Also there's https://futureofcoding.org https://futureofcoding.org which has a growing community of language and tool designers focused on live-coding languages. There's a good number of projects being developed by members there.
      - maxhallinan 8y ago
        Thanks!
- csomar 8y ago
  I honest think the probability of that is quite close to 0.
- O1111OOO 8y ago
  > I intend it when it reaches a certain spread - I don't want anyone to change that a little It's a good decision. You've created an easy to follow programming language, built a wonderful interface, provided excellent instructions. People often forget that the essence of the code (the spirit of that code) is driven by the vision (and passion) of a single individual. Sometimes (but rarely) more than one person shares this vision. I have literally seen 100s of programming languages on HN and quite frankly, they are mostly copy/paste of existing languages built around the same mindset of others - providing no real advantages to their target audience. The target audience for https://easyprog.online/ide/ https://easyprog.online/ide/ is different. The cost of entry (in the manner you have built this) is much smaller than other options for beginning coders. You've done a nice job with this! I very much like that you wish to continue to control the direction until it can establish itself in some way.

Vanderson 8y ago

The syntax/formatting reminds me of Lingo [0]. But also Logo and Basic. One of the things I really liked about coding in Lingo (in Director [1]) was the sparse syntax but the code auto-highlighted as you typed. (not common back then) But also auto indented as you typed. It was really easy and fast to program with. The graphics code reminded me of "hi-res" graphics programming on the Apple computer. Some nostalgia there. This brings me around to how magical it felt to program things for the first time as a kid, and how there doesn't seem to be an environment for this kind of excitement or discovery anymore. Maybe just a change of times, like how the first planes and auto-mobiles were created by hobbyists, but those times are mostly gone. Any notion on what a language like this would be good for? I get the impression maybe similar to my own nostalgia... [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lingo_(programming_language) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lingo_(programming_language) [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adobe_Director https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adobe_Director

chkas 8y ago
> Any notion on what a language like this would be good for? I get the impression maybe similar to my own nostalgia... I agree with you - learning programming was more fun in the past. It can be used as a first text-oriented learning language. I also like to use it myself to write simple games. https://easyprog.online/games/ https://easyprog.online/games/
- irq-1 8y ago
  The automatic formatting was nice, but I found a few times where I seemingly couldn't type; the formatter would just reset and ignore the key. For example I had "exit .." and couldn't hit enter to put the dots on the next line. New people probably won't understand why they can't press enter.
  - chkas 8y ago
    Thank you for pointing that out. When you press Enter, everything is parsed, including the current line. The current line will only be accepted if it is syntactically correct. Normally this works quite well, but for beginners this can be a real problem. With "Ctrl-R" you can see the error. I need to think about how to improve this.

AnaniasAnanas 8y ago

All I see is "Loading ..." and when looking at the console I see things like "Content Security Policy: The page’s settings blocked the loading of a resource at https://easyprog.online/games/easyw.js https://easyprog.online/games/easyw.js (“worker-src”).".

desireco42 8y ago

I like it, it is very well made and organized. I jumped to Monte Carlo methods and examples clearly explained what it was. I think this is great layout for teaching. Thank you for making it.

mrspeaker 8y ago

I really like this. Could you make the page load with the first demo code pre-loaded? I sat there looking at the code and hitting "run", checking the browser console to see if there was any error. Then I realised I had to press "load" first and then "run". Also, one bit of criticism: if it's not too late I'd also re-think the name. "Easyprog" is going to make any newbies really frustrated when they can't figure something out and the site is just mocking them: "lol, you can't figure it out and it's so EASY!". Other than that, I think this is a great project - really well done, and it has a lot of potential to me really great learning tool.

chkas 8y ago
Thank you for your feedback. I think I'll disable the run button if there's no code.
chkas 8y ago
> if it's not too late I'd also re-think the name I am also not yet satisfied with the name - so if you had a suggestion ...

mwexler 8y ago

Evokes logo/pilot with turtle graphics; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PILOT https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PILOT and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logo_(programming_language) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logo_(programming_language) which were both great fun back in the day...

amenghra 8y ago

a = 11 if a = 10 Great way to set someone up for failure when they switch to any C-like language! I personally have experienced people finding it easier to grasp a construct such as a := 1 or let a = 1. The way most programming languages assign values to variables conflicts with the notion of equations, which is familiar to a lot of people by the time they learn to write programs.

musicale 8y ago
Perhaps it's C that is weird for confusingly allowing you to assign within a logical expression. At least clang (and possibly other compilers) warn you because they assume you meant to write '=='. (Dartmouth BASIC required a LET keyword, Kemeny and Kurtz being mathematicians after all. Bill Gates might have made it optional in Microsoft BASIC to save typing and possibly one byte of memory.) I sort of miss Smalltalk's left-arrow though.