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There are software projects that get posted once in a while on HN that are on a completely different level of quality, whether it's product, UX, or tech. This i

by lxe 6y ago

There are software projects that get posted once in a while on HN that are on a completely different level of quality, whether it's product, UX, or tech. This is one of those posts.

stanislavb 6y ago
This one is amazing. I've cloned so many repos locally with the only reason to explore them with the comfort of VS Code.
- news_hacker 6y ago
  I really wish it had Cmd+P support for searching for project files. I find the project a really cool concept, but am genuinely curious what real value this is adding in it's current incarnation? Navigating the folder structure is kinda nice, but I don't see much else. Am I missing something obvious?
  - KiranRao0 6y ago
    Nothing obvious. I've found Cmd+Shift+P, then delete the > character, works extremely well in place of Cmd+P.
  - perryizgr8 6y ago
    > what real value this is adding in it's current incarnation? Ctrl+Shift+F works. I've forgotten how many repos I clone off github just to be able to search all through the code.
    - xmprt 6y ago
      Github allows you to search through repositories as long as they're not forks.
      - perryizgr8 6y ago
        How does that work? I've never been able to find this option. Also, this tool's search is broken. It searches only the currently open file.
      - KerrickStaley 6y ago
        GitHub search is notoriously poor, though—it can only match whole words (e.g. the query "FooBar" does not match the text "FooBarBaz"), and it doesn't support regexes.
        dathinab 6y ago
        And way worse it doesn't even keep word order and similar. So searching for `fn foobar` will return any file containing the words `fn` and `foobar` not caring about you looking for `fn foobar`. Then if you find what you want opening the preview doesn't jump to the right line in the file so I have to search again using "find in page".
        loganlinn 6y ago
        If anyone is looking for actually useful cross-repo search: https://grep.app/ https://grep.app/
        Ayesh 6y ago
        This is great, thank you.
      - nightpool 6y ago
        In addition to the flaws mentioned by the other commenters (whole word only, no regexes), Github will only search the master branch of a repo, which makes it useless for my two most common tasks "where did this code used to be used" and "does this unmerged PR manage to remove all of the references to this code in its refactor (incl. in comments/etc)" EDIT: Unfortunately, it seems like search doesn't work at all on this site, which is a shame. (at least, when I tried to do it on https://github1s.com/rails/rails https://github1s.com/rails/rails it failed)
      - 6y ago
    - rkangel 6y ago
      > Ctrl+Shift+F works It's not working for me (it's also the first thing I wanted). It only seems to search through files that are already open in an editor tab. E.g. in the vscode repo linked from the README search for "nodeModulesPath" and no results, but open bootstrap-node.js and it's there on line 22.
  - visarga 6y ago
    > Am I missing something obvious? Better search, find definition, ...
    - chrisshroba 6y ago
      Search is completely broken for me... for example on https://github1s.com/matryer/bitbar https://github1s.com/matryer/bitbar, searching for just the letter "a" returns no results. Am I doing something wrong?
      - Kwantuum 6y ago
        Search appears to only work once the files are cached, if you open a file then close it, search will find it.
        chrisshroba 6y ago
        Ah, makes sense! Thanks!
        Brian_K_White 6y ago
        Then you need to cache all files, which you were already doing years ago by cloning and browsing locally. I too see no special value in the end.
  - arebhaibhai 6y ago
    > I really wish it had Cmd+P support for searching for project files. Works for me. CTRL+P on Linux though.
    - deleted 6y ago
      [deleted]
  - ollysb 6y ago
    It appears to only work for files which have already been opened.
  - flanbiscuit 6y ago
    Confirmed CMD+P just worked for me on mac. Shift+CMD+P does not but without Shift it works
- dingran 6y ago
  Yeah, I do the same. I feel the thing that's missing is navigate to definitions/declarations (cmd+])
- soenkeliebau 6y ago
  This, so much this!
- beermonster 6y ago
  Yup. T'is pretty good indeed. I have told world+dog.
sudeepj 6y ago
Agreed. This also demonstrates: Does one-thing and does it well.
- alpb 6y ago
  It surely opens a repo in VSCode, but it doesn't seem to have any language server support built in. For example, if I open a Go repository, I can't navigate code (Go to references, Find references etc). GitHub Workspaces (although takes waaay longer to provision) is better at this. I wish GitHub did a faster loading read-only version like this.
  - hoten 6y ago
    I'm only speculating, but the reason is likely because language servers are not written in JS. I assume electron apps can spin up arbitrary processes, allowing for a language servers to be written in anything. It'd be neat to see these language servers compiled to WASM and run as a web worker, although I suspect vscode isn't setup for that. I think Codespaces is able to pull it off because the language servers, and vscode itself, is really running on Github's backends. They've set up the frontend to connect to a remote host.
  - arcticbull 6y ago
    I handle this by firing up a Fargate instance with a Docker container pre-configured for VSCode Remote SSH. Then once you connect to it, you can install whatever language server you want assuming it's not baked into the Docker image. An EFS mount persists my sources across runs too, and I can scale it up to whatever size Fargate instance my development of the day needs. Would be cool to tie it into this.
  - vijaybritto 6y ago
    Thats the trade off. If you have everything supported upfront then the loading performance would be abysmal and it would take 2 minutes to load the entire app on a desktop machine. This is perfect for browsing through code.
fancyfish 6y ago
This. This just nails it. I honestly was in awe when I saw this repo, you don’t see these very often on here. So much Tier 1 talent in all aspects - product, UX, and tech. Flawless execution on all fronts. I’ve always wanted an easy way to preview a repo in VS Code and this is it.
- mrmonkeyman 6y ago
  It wraps an existing browser app in a, wait for it, browser. What in this repo is tier1? The wrapping of existing code? The app is an unremarkable text editor. The bar needs to go up, not down people.
heyoo 6y ago
So surely, it will never make money. :(
- forgotmypw17 6y ago
  why is that a sad face? do things have to earn money to have any worth?
  - stjo 6y ago
    It would be nice reward the author for making something that is useful, not just by patting him/her on the back. I think that is what heyoo is talking about
    - krelian 6y ago
      Creating a useful tool that becomes well known (or a de facto standard) in the community, a successful project you proudly add to your resume, can pay for itself and much more indirectly.
      - systemvoltage 6y ago
        Not as lucrative as profiting directly from it. I respect non open source software very much. They put hard work into it, and I have absolutely zero, zilch right to ask for its source. I am willing and happy to pay for a service if it benefits me. OSS and non-OSS can coexist. There is no need to bash on non-OSS software. It's folks like you and me, writing code, providing for the family. Github1s, I could see myself paying $50 for a yearly fee. I would use this thing all the time.
  - pestaa 6y ago
    I get the opposite vibe from the parent comment: that usefulness and worthiness is often detached from monetary reward. How nice it would be for great work to be compensated more fairly.
  - blocked_again 6y ago
crazypython 6y ago
We are so used to JavaScript SPAs taking a long time to load. People will Webpack it then use a tool to inline CSS and sort scripts. I find it easier and faster to use no loader at all, and manually sort scripts. The build process is less likely to break, because there is none, and it builds instantly, because there is none, it loads directly from the filesystem. Most modern browsers (even with IE11 included) support enough ES6 features that you can write your code directly in the common supported subset.[0] I had a multiplayer game with hundreds of hours of gameplay get on the front page with "loads in less than one second" in the HN headline. (http://vnav.io http://vnav.io) [0]: https://wwwperiodictable.surge.sh https://wwwperiodictable.surge.sh

by lxe 6y ago

There are software projects that get posted once in a while on HN that are on a completely different level of quality, whether it's product, UX, or tech. This is one of those posts.

stanislavb 6y ago

This one is amazing. I've cloned so many repos locally with the only reason to explore them with the comfort of VS Code.

news_hacker 6y ago
I really wish it had Cmd+P support for searching for project files. I find the project a really cool concept, but am genuinely curious what real value this is adding in it's current incarnation? Navigating the folder structure is kinda nice, but I don't see much else. Am I missing something obvious?
- KiranRao0 6y ago
  Nothing obvious. I've found Cmd+Shift+P, then delete the > character, works extremely well in place of Cmd+P.
- perryizgr8 6y ago
  > what real value this is adding in it's current incarnation? Ctrl+Shift+F works. I've forgotten how many repos I clone off github just to be able to search all through the code.
  - xmprt 6y ago
    Github allows you to search through repositories as long as they're not forks.
    - perryizgr8 6y ago
      How does that work? I've never been able to find this option. Also, this tool's search is broken. It searches only the currently open file.
    - KerrickStaley 6y ago
      GitHub search is notoriously poor, though—it can only match whole words (e.g. the query "FooBar" does not match the text "FooBarBaz"), and it doesn't support regexes.
      - dathinab 6y ago
        And way worse it doesn't even keep word order and similar. So searching for `fn foobar` will return any file containing the words `fn` and `foobar` not caring about you looking for `fn foobar`. Then if you find what you want opening the preview doesn't jump to the right line in the file so I have to search again using "find in page".
      - loganlinn 6y ago
        If anyone is looking for actually useful cross-repo search: https://grep.app/ https://grep.app/
        Ayesh 6y ago
        This is great, thank you.
    - nightpool 6y ago
      In addition to the flaws mentioned by the other commenters (whole word only, no regexes), Github will only search the master branch of a repo, which makes it useless for my two most common tasks "where did this code used to be used" and "does this unmerged PR manage to remove all of the references to this code in its refactor (incl. in comments/etc)" EDIT: Unfortunately, it seems like search doesn't work at all on this site, which is a shame. (at least, when I tried to do it on https://github1s.com/rails/rails https://github1s.com/rails/rails it failed)
    - 6y ago
  - rkangel 6y ago
    > Ctrl+Shift+F works It's not working for me (it's also the first thing I wanted). It only seems to search through files that are already open in an editor tab. E.g. in the vscode repo linked from the README search for "nodeModulesPath" and no results, but open bootstrap-node.js and it's there on line 22.
- visarga 6y ago
  > Am I missing something obvious? Better search, find definition, ...
  - chrisshroba 6y ago
    Search is completely broken for me... for example on https://github1s.com/matryer/bitbar https://github1s.com/matryer/bitbar, searching for just the letter "a" returns no results. Am I doing something wrong?
    - Kwantuum 6y ago
      Search appears to only work once the files are cached, if you open a file then close it, search will find it.
      - chrisshroba 6y ago
        Ah, makes sense! Thanks!
      - Brian_K_White 6y ago
        Then you need to cache all files, which you were already doing years ago by cloning and browsing locally. I too see no special value in the end.
- arebhaibhai 6y ago
  > I really wish it had Cmd+P support for searching for project files. Works for me. CTRL+P on Linux though.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
- ollysb 6y ago
  It appears to only work for files which have already been opened.
- flanbiscuit 6y ago
  Confirmed CMD+P just worked for me on mac. Shift+CMD+P does not but without Shift it works
dingran 6y ago
Yeah, I do the same. I feel the thing that's missing is navigate to definitions/declarations (cmd+])
soenkeliebau 6y ago
This, so much this!
beermonster 6y ago
Yup. T'is pretty good indeed. I have told world+dog.

sudeepj 6y ago

Agreed. This also demonstrates: Does one-thing and does it well.

alpb 6y ago
It surely opens a repo in VSCode, but it doesn't seem to have any language server support built in. For example, if I open a Go repository, I can't navigate code (Go to references, Find references etc). GitHub Workspaces (although takes waaay longer to provision) is better at this. I wish GitHub did a faster loading read-only version like this.
- hoten 6y ago
  I'm only speculating, but the reason is likely because language servers are not written in JS. I assume electron apps can spin up arbitrary processes, allowing for a language servers to be written in anything. It'd be neat to see these language servers compiled to WASM and run as a web worker, although I suspect vscode isn't setup for that. I think Codespaces is able to pull it off because the language servers, and vscode itself, is really running on Github's backends. They've set up the frontend to connect to a remote host.
- arcticbull 6y ago
  I handle this by firing up a Fargate instance with a Docker container pre-configured for VSCode Remote SSH. Then once you connect to it, you can install whatever language server you want assuming it's not baked into the Docker image. An EFS mount persists my sources across runs too, and I can scale it up to whatever size Fargate instance my development of the day needs. Would be cool to tie it into this.
- vijaybritto 6y ago
  Thats the trade off. If you have everything supported upfront then the loading performance would be abysmal and it would take 2 minutes to load the entire app on a desktop machine. This is perfect for browsing through code.

fancyfish 6y ago

This. This just nails it. I honestly was in awe when I saw this repo, you don’t see these very often on here. So much Tier 1 talent in all aspects - product, UX, and tech. Flawless execution on all fronts. I’ve always wanted an easy way to preview a repo in VS Code and this is it.

mrmonkeyman 6y ago
It wraps an existing browser app in a, wait for it, browser. What in this repo is tier1? The wrapping of existing code? The app is an unremarkable text editor. The bar needs to go up, not down people.

heyoo 6y ago

So surely, it will never make money. :(

forgotmypw17 6y ago
why is that a sad face? do things have to earn money to have any worth?
- stjo 6y ago
  It would be nice reward the author for making something that is useful, not just by patting him/her on the back. I think that is what heyoo is talking about
  - krelian 6y ago
    Creating a useful tool that becomes well known (or a de facto standard) in the community, a successful project you proudly add to your resume, can pay for itself and much more indirectly.
    - systemvoltage 6y ago
      Not as lucrative as profiting directly from it. I respect non open source software very much. They put hard work into it, and I have absolutely zero, zilch right to ask for its source. I am willing and happy to pay for a service if it benefits me. OSS and non-OSS can coexist. There is no need to bash on non-OSS software. It's folks like you and me, writing code, providing for the family. Github1s, I could see myself paying $50 for a yearly fee. I would use this thing all the time.
- pestaa 6y ago
  I get the opposite vibe from the parent comment: that usefulness and worthiness is often detached from monetary reward. How nice it would be for great work to be compensated more fairly.
- blocked_again 6y ago

crazypython 6y ago

We are so used to JavaScript SPAs taking a long time to load. People will Webpack it then use a tool to inline CSS and sort scripts. I find it easier and faster to use no loader at all, and manually sort scripts. The build process is less likely to break, because there is none, and it builds instantly, because there is none, it loads directly from the filesystem. Most modern browsers (even with IE11 included) support enough ES6 features that you can write your code directly in the common supported subset.[0] I had a multiplayer game with hundreds of hours of gameplay get on the front page with "loads in less than one second" in the HN headline. (http://vnav.io http://vnav.io) [0]: https://wwwperiodictable.surge.sh https://wwwperiodictable.surge.sh