1. Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

Hi

Watched the Euphoria is dying thread, and as usual watched a lot of negativity mixed in with a lot of positive, but suppressed, positive points. One of the most interesting replies was

spikeysnack said...

Actually I just picked up on Euphoria a few weeks ago and after small learning curve ( I already know the C language and Computer Science ) I was surprised at the ease of writing code with minimal errors as long as you get the syntax correct.

I don't think the language is dying, I just think that it is being shouted about loudly enough - as I said on EuphoriaAL we need a marketing guru, or strategy.

So what's Euphoria great at (not what are its shortcomings, or what feature doen't it have, or what languages are better)

Firstly how about a bullet list of great points

  • Its dead easy to pick up and learn - the newby to the experienced programmer will be writing code in no time.
  • It's easy to install
  • it's multiplatform
  • it's great for the casual programmer
  • It's great for writing 2d games (I know we don't have a lot of 2D game programmers, but that would only be a short hop (pun intended))
  • Super fast development cycle
  • Friendly forum

Now look at the home page - the page where most people who land looking around for a different / alternative / quick programming language (that's what I did). What does that shout at you? That there's been an outage! Who'd want to come back. The home page should be a landing page that grabs someone by the short and curlies, shakes them and says 'Look how easy I am!' (or other such stuff)

Next - I've donated to OpenEu - not a lot admittedly, but where's the list of contributors - the hall of fame. And what 'extras' do contributors get? Where's the T-shirt?

How about Pastey - a great online repository / programming library - how easy it is to find deposited code, how easy to use and so on.

How about the structure of the development team - wheres that displayed, what are the 'job' openings and so on.

How about some real world examples? How about some screenshots?

Lots of tweaks are needed, and none related to actually programming. I really believe that Eu is a better language than Java and Python and Ruby and so on, for a certain type of programmer, of which I suspect there potentially a larger number than the other languages. Yes its got its downsides and detractors, but so do the other languages.

Hope there's some food for thought here!

Chris

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2. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

In my time not Euphoria is dying but my free time is and my lifetimehorizon too (and so is yours !). Since 1995 its my toolbox and dont want any other anymore. Never got any rust on it. Good quality stuff. Happy. Like to program the old way: like a carpenter always doing the simplest things and every time better. Keep things simple saves your soul ! (Started with the TRS80 in 1980: Z80 & Basic & machinelanguage on tape !) Worked for years on QuoteProgram, BibleProgram, ReligiousCDMusicWithLyricsProgram, 'Simple'ColoredTextPageProgram, tryed to combine psychology with astrology but because of the damned cosmologic math had to turn it into the QuoteProgram with lovely search-engine that listens to listed names and listed indexed words. Uses 1001+ 'stolen' quotes for personal use only. The BibleProgram still doesnt work well, will it ever ? The 'Simple'ColoredTextPageProgram was working kind of html-like (in 2007) and should become part of the QuoteProgram, ever ... some bolts are not twisted right. QuoteProgram and BibleProgram should merge. Working also on a computerconnection by way of 2 Velleman interfaces to avoid ebolaworms biting my ever happy & lonely desktop. It would also be able to address a keyboardchip connected to the internetcomputer for safe passwords and stuff. It may sound strange : Bible and psychology together with programming. Well, I admire Leonardo da Vinci and Emanuel Swedenborg because they are not only very techy too but they are as well very spiritual and feeling for art and most of all: God and His creation. You should find out. Its really worth studiyng. Most BiblePrograms work with a terrible indexsys and I want to feel totally free, so ... Quotes and BibleVerses on a selfmade search-and-read Euphoria-machine together with a CD turning heavenly music ... it brings you closer to heaven. In all those years had lot of help from Euphoria-archive. That does not turn the Euphorians into angels but it does it to me ! So I dont have to thank you ... devils

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3. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

I tend to agree with everything ChrisB says. The language itself is more than usable ... we need 'marketing' and, as my ex-wife would say, 'branding'. Example of the latter: every time someone sees a certain phrase or logo they immediately think of OpenEuphoria. Think of a trademark situation.

The OpenEuphoria home page is OK and if you're already familiar with what OE is it's adequate. BUT ... if you're new (just found it by using Google, e.g.) then it can be pretty confusing. Maybe ChrisB's ideas of 'spicing it up' would be a good first step? My time is pretty limited but I'd be willing to help with ideas, mockups based on those ideas, etc. I WOULD suggest that a group get together 'off-line' from the forum and focus on that without everybody and his brother 'helping' at every stage ... once we have what the group thinks is a workable page and or marketing plan we can then open it up to comments.

Just my 2c worth here of course ... and as always this is worth exactly what you paid for it :) :) :)

Tom
Forked into: Open Euphony -- for "offline" Euphoria discussions

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4. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

tbohon said...

Maybe ChrisB's ideas of 'spicing it up' would be a good first step?

It's hard to get good figures of how many users there are of the many programming languages we have at the moment. Nevertheless, it would be instructive to have a look at the front pages of the ones that are getting some good press to see what lessons can be gleaned from them. Over on scoop.it, there's been a series of articles on recent programming languages. That's be a good place to start, I reckon.

Something else that might attract another class of users to the "Euphoria Experience" would be a Euphoria to javascript compiler, see List of languages that compile to JS. More than half of my programming effort these days is web-focussed. I still do the other stuff for back-end tools and the like, but it'd be cool to be Euphoric in both arenas.

My two bob.

Kind regards,
bugmagnet

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5. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

Oh, and for all you alternate syntax types, check out the readme for Ham

bugmagnet

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6. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

So I lurk around the site a few times a year to see if there's any news and developments. I do this because my first programming language was Euphoria. I never got far with it, eventually I learned JavaScript and then C and that led me to my current career path into gaming. The number 1 issue I can see whenever I come in is a lack of a focus. The Euphoria language is too general to find its niche. You see stuff for GUI, Web scripting, and a million other things. Euphoria as a language fits the old saying, "Jack of all trades, master of none" really well.

There's no killer Framework that would make me want to drop what I'm currently using. But that's not really the languages fault. Really that comes down to the community. Is anyone willing to make that killer framework that defines Euphoria? Of course there could be a better marketing campaign and to be honest I think the mascot could be revamped. Ferrets are cuddly and cute, that red eyed thing looks like nothing I want near me. But in the end, even if you get an amazing marketing guru, what's the message?

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7. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

Brief introduction: I've been a longtime observer of Euphoria, and did some work with 3.1.1 a few years back. Here are my thoughts on language adoption:

  1. There is little need for another general purpose programming language (as mentioned by g1i1ch and others), which seems to be where OpenEuphoria is currently positioned.
  2. Investing in learning a new language and the associated frameworks is like starting a long-term relationship. It's not something to be taken lightly.
  3. Coders will learn a new language for one of three reasons: marketable skills, best tool for the job, or curiosity.
  4. OpenEuphoria is not situated to provide strong marketable skills (nobody's hiring Eu coders). Some of us will use it because of curiosity, but this means the language will remain niche.
  5. In my opinion, this leaves best tool for the job as the ideal position for the language.


The obvious question is which job is OpenEuphoria ideally situated for? It appears that most of the current base uses the language as a general purpose tool, but it's going to be tough to attract new users that way. Consider the positioning of popular languages:

  • php: robust web development, scripting
  • javascript: client web, desktop, server (node.js), games, ...
  • java / c#: general purpose desktop, enterprise web development
  • python, perl: sysadmin, general purpose scripting
  • c, cpp: systems programming, client application programming, game development (Cpp)

Every language on the list above (including php) could be thought of as a general purpose programming language, and the list is by no means exhaustive. Each language has also found a niche where it is one of a handful of default tools (in a field crowded with alternatives). It's not fair to put Euphoria up against this list of general-purpose languages (even if it's also excellent at solving these same problems).

I didn't mention Lua, but I think it's worth special consideration since Lua has many similarities to OpenEuphoria. The reason Lua is known at all outside of academic circles is because it is an ideal embedded language (we use it for this at my work). Because of this it is the language of choice for AAA game companies to embed and allow for user mods. There are entire industries that have formed around the Lua modding community, and it has also made its way into popular game frameworks:

  • CoronaSDK (mobile)
  • Love (desktop)
  • Marmalade (mobile/desktop)
  • MOAI (mobile/desktop)

Lua is no better than Euphoria but it's just perfect for embedding and therefore it's got a following.

Okay, now back to OpenEuphoria. These were the reasons why I was originally attracted to the development environment (more so than the language itself):

  1. Very small runtime (a few MB vs. a large framework for java, python, etc)
  2. Easy deployment (exe)
  3. Extremely fast
  4. Cross platform
  5. Easy access to native libraries (way easier than other scripting languages)
  6. Few (no?) dependencies
  7. Translate to c for pure performance


I believe that these strengths are rather unique among scripting languages.

These advantages seem to point at a client side niche rather than server side (where they are less advantageous). I think they are absolutely perfect for a game framework (desktop), which could attract a decent amount of attention to the language. Indie game development is all the rage right now - and there's not a hands down code-only/scripting winner in the desktop gamedev category. Easy access to native libraries and easy deployment makes this a killer combo.

OpenEuphoria is also perfectly situated as a first language, and I think this could be combined with a game development framework as the perfect one-two punch. By attracting new coders with a cool game framework and making it dead easy to get started (would require lots of tutorials, etc) I think Euphoria could be given the necessary "kick in the pants".

In conclusion, in order to gain new users it's not enough to position as a general-purpose programming language. OpenEuphoria must find a niche where its unique strengths are leveraged. OpenEuphoria could reposition by building out a robust game-centric API and tune it for beginners. This needn't be part of the core platform, but a framework built on top of it. It could be given a cool name and logo and launched to get some attention from the (very busy) indie gaming press.

Behind the game engine is the robust OpenEuphoria platform itself, an excellent general-purpose tool. Once coders learn the ropes by making some games, they'll stay and contribute to the core community.

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8. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

MatthewMacGregor said...

Okay, now back to OpenEuphoria. These were the reasons why I was originally attracted to the development environment (more so than the language itself):

  1. Very small runtime (a few MB vs. a large framework for java, python, etc)
  2. Easy deployment (exe)
  3. Extremely fast
  4. Cross platform
  5. Easy access to native libraries (way easier than other scripting languages)
  6. Few (no?) dependencies
  7. Translate to c for pure performance


I believe that these strengths are rather unique among scripting languages.

These advantages seem to point at a client side niche rather than server side (where they are less advantageous). I think they are absolutely perfect for a game framework (desktop), which could attract a decent amount of attention to the language. Indie game development is all the rage right now - and there's not a hands down code-only/scripting winner in the desktop gamedev category. Easy access to native libraries and easy deployment makes this a killer combo.

OpenEuphoria is also perfectly situated as a first language, and I think this could be combined with a game development framework as the perfect one-two punch. By attracting new coders with a cool game framework and making it dead easy to get started (would require lots of tutorials, etc) I think Euphoria could be given the necessary "kick in the pants".

In conclusion, in order to gain new users it's not enough to position as a general-purpose programming language. OpenEuphoria must find a niche where its unique strengths are leveraged. OpenEuphoria could reposition by building out a robust game-centric API and tune it for beginners. This needn't be part of the core platform, but a framework built on top of it. It could be given a cool name and logo and launched to get some attention from the (very busy) indie gaming press.

Behind the game engine is the robust OpenEuphoria platform itself, an excellent general-purpose tool. Once coders learn the ropes by making some games, they'll stay and contribute to the core community.

An excellent summary, Matthew, of all what is best in OpenEuphoria.

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9. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

Hi

Yes, very well thought out, and logically put.

Chris

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10. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

Excellent points. I have always thought Euphoria should be used as a scripting engine, but there's no easy way to do that, currently. I picture a version of the interpreter that is in a dll or so file, with a simple set of functions a parent program can access to interact with a euphoria program (open/modify euphoria source code, run or stop a program, and call euphoria functions or procedures).

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11. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

Yes, that's interesting. One of euphoria's strengths is the ability to address code in native libraries. It makes it almost ideal as a "binding" language, forming the glue between native code. But it's not ideally suited as an embedded scripting language - at least, not that I'm aware of. Maybe one of the architects could set me straight on that?

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12. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

MatthewMacGregor said...

Yes, that's interesting. One of euphoria's strengths is the ability to address code in native libraries. It makes it almost ideal as a "binding" language, forming the glue between native code. But it's not ideally suited as an embedded scripting language - at least, not that I'm aware of. Maybe one of the architects could set me straight on that?

Embeddability is something that we would really like to have. IIRC it is already on the roadmap.

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13. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!


In stead of wishing about being able to use scripting in Eu why don't you

go to archive and look at what users have done in the past to get some ideas ??

http://rapideuphoria.com/cgi-bin/asearch.exu?dos=on&win=on&lnx=on&gen=on&keywords=script

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14. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

BRyan said...


In stead of wishing about being able to use scripting in Eu why don't you

go to archive and look at what users have done in the past to get some ideas ??

http://rapideuphoria.com/cgi-bin/asearch.exu?dos=on&win=on&lnx=on&gen=on&keywords=script

Sorry, but I don't get it. Most of the results from the Archive search you suggested are not even remotely relevant to what we were talking about (i.e. embeddability).

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15. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

I think the main point here is not embedding (for this lua is the winner), but being able to make games in pure openeuphoria. Its more about a framework than dealing with alien languages. Something like Flixel(http://flixel.org) for ActionScript or Cocos2d(http://cocos2d.org/) for python...

Sorry my poor english

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16. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

elias_maluko said...

I think the main point here is not embedding (for this lua is the winner), but being able to make games in pure openeuphoria.

Yes, Lua is currently the winner... precisely because Euphoria cannot be embedded (yet). Otherwise there are excellent chances that Euphoria would be #1 in this domain, because it is much faster.

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17. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

GreenEuphorian said...
BRyan said...


In stead of wishing about being able to use scripting in Eu why don't you

go to archive and look at what users have done in the past to get some ideas ??

http://rapideuphoria.com/cgi-bin/asearch.exu?dos=on&win=on&lnx=on&gen=on&keywords=script

Sorry, but I don't get it. Most of the results from the Archive search you suggested are not even remotely relevant to what we were talking about (i.e. embeddability).


FROM THE DOC IN THE ZIP FILE
Topaz is an imbedded, stack-based scripting engine. What this means is,
Topaz is an engine you can place directly into your Euphoria code.

Here is a refined search for Topaz which was in the first url! http://www.rapideuphoria.com/cgi-bin/asearch.exu?dos=on&win=on&lnx=on&gen=on&keywords=topaz

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18. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

BRyan said...
GreenEuphorian said...
BRyan said...


In stead of wishing about being able to use scripting in Eu why don't you

go to archive and look at what users have done in the past to get some ideas ??

http://rapideuphoria.com/cgi-bin/asearch.exu?dos=on&win=on&lnx=on&gen=on&keywords=script

Sorry, but I don't get it. Most of the results from the Archive search you suggested are not even remotely relevant to what we were talking about (i.e. embeddability).


FROM THE DOC IN THE ZIP FILE
Topaz is an imbedded, stack-based scripting engine. What this means is,
Topaz is an engine you can place directly into your Euphoria code.

Like GreenEuphorian said, "not even remotely relevant to what we are talking about (i.e. embeddability)."

I think the best that could be done right now is to take Matt Lewis's eueval library (which lets you write scripts in Euphoria (and not Topaz or some other language) and embed them directly in your Euphoria program), and make a C dll shim around it (which would let a C code program use scripts written in Euphoria on the fly).

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19. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

I like easy-go Euphoria creeping into my blood and I would be programming just for pleasure, loving structured colored code, endless, forgetting time, nearly reaching bleeding edges and solving errors and hey it works, but leaving also an empty feeling. Thats why I dont want C or Python etc, its too much unnecessary brainwork. Try composing music, and playing a classic instrument is more real life AND fun AND it can open soul, mind, spirit. But why is it that I fabricate a note-reading and playing application ? Just to have the feeling I can control everything ? Building a wooden organ is better than coding but you cannot feed it easily with programmed notes, although it would be so nice to add an interface. (www.youtube.com/user/bd594) It must be obsession, no, possession by technical ... devils.

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20. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

A new user of Euphoria, this really speaks to me. There is certainly something compelling about the language but a sweep of the forum does kick up a fair amount of negativity, concerns about Euphoria's imminent "death" and so on.

One thing I can't help but wonder is, who has control over rapideuphoria.com - is there any possibility of reaching out to the admin and if nothing else making the front page redirect to the new and progressive-looking openeuphoria.org? Or working with them to strike down some of the ... overwhelming 1980s naffness?

That's not to be rude or cruel, but I'll be honest and say on looking at Euphoria it did rather leave the wrong impression.

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21. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

It kind of raises the question why the old site is there at all; I mean, the link to Openeuphoria isn't even in a particularly prominent position on the homepage, so presumably many who land on the site won't even be aware that there is a version other than 3.1.1., or if they do, could be forgiven for assuming that it's a development release, and that they should download the "official" release, which is version 3.

Maybe Rob just isn't interested any more; he certainly doesn't seem to have been actively involved in the development of 4.x. Or perhaps the situation is similar to Python, except that the old version of euphoria seems to be "abandonware", unlike Python 2.x.

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22. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

Bazzadude said...

A new user of Euphoria, this really speaks to me. There is certainly something compelling about the language but a sweep of the forum does kick up a fair amount of negativity, concerns about Euphoria's imminent "death" and so on.

One thing I can't help but wonder is, who has control over rapideuphoria.com - is there any possibility of reaching out to the admin and if nothing else making the front page redirect to the new and progressive-looking openeuphoria.org? Or working with them to strike down some of the ... overwhelming 1980s naffness?

That's not to be rude or cruel, but I'll be honest and say on looking at Euphoria it did rather leave the wrong impression.

Maybe a quick history recap is in order ... but first an explanation of terms.

  • Euphoria is the name of a programming language. It was invented by Robert Craig in the early 1990s.
  • RapidEuphoria is the name of the web site that hosts Robert's incarnation of Euphoria.
  • OpenEuphoria is the name of the web site that hosts an incarnation of Euphoria that has evolved from Robert's.

For various reasons that aren't relevant here, Robert Craig stopped working on Euphoria. He made the source code available to everyone and it still is that way. One group, and I use that term loosely, decided to take the version 3.1.1 version of Robert's Euphoria and develop it. This development was a huge change to the base source code and added a lot of capability to the language. It was released as Euphoria version 4, and I stress, Robert had no part in this development. One of the major features of V4 is that for the most part, it accepts V3 source unchanged.

The OpenEuphoria group is a very loose collection of people from around the planet, with members coming and going frequently. All their work is voluntary and most have a demanding life outside of Euphoria development. It funds the servers, domain names, and whatever mandatory expenses have come about, from their own pockets and a few donations. The biggest reward for working in the group, a part from the joy of achieving something worthwhile, is their name in the contributions page.

The step from version 3.1.1 to version 4.0 was enormous, time consuming, and personally draining for all contributors. The current pace of releases is testament to the available time and energy available to the contributing members (anyone who has something positive to bring to the language, can join, by the way, just ask). It is slow because we don't have the resources to make it go faster. And please remember, this is still a Work In Progress - the job ain't done yet.

If you can't, or don't want, to be one of the development group, we still desire and need your views on both the current implementations and the potential future capabilities of the language. Literally everyone is invited so speak their mind freely on that topic.

Also be aware that there exists other branches of the Euphoria language that have nothing to do with the OpenEuphoria implementation. Do the research to find out more.

I think that Euphoria is an outstanding language and Robert has created something of wonder and beauty. As to which incarnation you prefer, well ... that's up to you and that's perfectly okay.

As for the OpenEuphoria implementation, if you have issues with it, please be specific. Such comments like 'it is bloated' are not helpful as they do not address anything that can be specifically "fixed". I implore you all to be critical and to do so in a constructive manner because I'm pretty sure that we all want to end up with a language and implementation that is worthy of global praise.

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23. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

ChrisB said...

I don't think the language is dying, I just think that it is being shouted about loudly enough - as I said on EuphoriaAL we need a marketing guru, or strategy.

Euphoria cannot die, it's too useful to die. I write in 10 Euphoria lines, with my left hand holding a cup of coffee, and only elementary education - what C+ + can do, only after graduating university, with 100 ugly lines.

Who needs C+ +, except for making money??? With storage of multi-giga-bytes, and CPU's of 3Ghz - who needs C+ +??? only system developers. Most of us could forget about C or C+ +.

Writing a spreadsheet using Euphoria, for example, will be much easier to code and *maintain*. Speed...? who cares these days. Then why wasting time with ugly code? you tell me. I prefer to finish programming quicker and go practice Taekwondo. Only Euphoria allows me to live like this - C or Java takes all my time, and yea, we don't live forever.

-

The biggest mistake, in my opinion, of Euphoria developers, is to target the language to experienced programmers. i.e.: being not realistic.

A programming language is like a baby. Baby don't born at the age of 21 years old.

By ignoring young and not experience programmers - Euphoria actually blocked its future. Why can't you all understand it?

For example, how would you all feel if I'll take you to a Tea Kwon Do lesson and expect from you to practice jump hook kick on the first day? - you would all break your backs and be rushed to hospital.

What you're doing is deliberately ignoring young and unexperienced programmers.

Answers as: look at the editors list, tools list, and take a patch from here and combine it with a patch from there - is an immature and pathetic strategy.

The target users for an easy-to-use-all-purpose-language must be EVERYONE to succeed. User should play with the language and enjoy it. If one of 100 users will become a serious programmer it's enough. Users should create their own "fun clubs" for the language. Unexperienced users should get excited from the language after writing "hello world!". The language should reach the people.

Euphoria is too arrogant. and that's what blocking its popularity.

Please wake up: Euphoria should be friendly for 15 years old teens to become popular. MS$ invested a fortune to make their products friendly - just to make them popular.

Now that Euphoria 3 is mature, and Euphoria 4 is great - it's about time to invest effort on making it friendly. Those who criticized the importance of Euphoria IDE are blind and misleading. MS$ invested from QBASIC to "Visual Studio" billions because you cannot gain popularity by targeting your products to old users. Only the young users can make it. MS$ knows it.

Why Euphoria is so arrogant??? Is Euphoria has some kind of feelings of inferiority? Euphoria isn't C+ + - that's the great thing! Euphoria isn't Basic - that's also the great thing! Why targeting Euphoria to professionals by introducing the language with vocabulary that new users never heard about?

It's fine to add struct to Euphoria - lots of experienced programmers might be benefit from it. But don't fool yourselves that it will gain any popularity to this language, because popularity is gained by young and fresh people - not by middle age professionals.

I talk too much but this is really annoying. Non of the developers seem to understand the evolution of popularity - it always starts from young and unexperienced people - which Euphoria ignores deliberately.

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24. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

Shian_Lee said...

... It's fine to add struct to Euphoria - lots of experienced programmers might be benefit from it. But don't fool yourselves that it will gain any popularity to this language, because popularity is gained by young and fresh people - not by middle age professionals.

I talk too much but this is really annoying. Non of the developers seem to understand the evolution of popularity - it always starts from young and unexperienced people - which Euphoria ignores deliberately.

Ahhh.. the hubris of youth. Well I suggest you quickly join the development team while you still know everything.

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25. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

DerekParnell said...

Ahhh.. the hubris of youth. Well I suggest you quickly join the development team while you still know everything.

I am 45 years old, and I know something - not everything. I have a lot of experience in other areas, not programming.

All I am trying to do is to help, from respect to your hard and great work.

If you cannot understand my meaning - then this is strange.

"the hubris of youth" is a reflection of the "arrogance of adults". wake up.

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26. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

Shian_Lee said...

The biggest mistake, in my opinion, of Euphoria developers, is to target the language to experienced programmers. i.e.: being not realistic.

I do not think that the developers are targeting the language to any group in particular. What evidence can you present that leads you to your conclusion?

Shian_Lee said...

A programming language is like a baby. Baby don't born at the age of 21 years old.

By ignoring young and not experience programmers - Euphoria actually blocked its future. Why can't you all understand it?

Why do you think that inexperienced programmers are being ignored?

And do you think that Euphoria should also cater for the needs of programmers, regardless of their level of experience?

Shian_Lee said...

For example, how would you all feel if I'll take you to a Tea Kwon Do lesson and expect from you to practice jump hook kick on the first day? - you would all break your backs and be rushed to hospital.

What you're doing is deliberately ignoring young and unexperienced programmers.

In my opinion, you are mistaken with your assessment of Euphoria, and I'd like to know why you think this so that we can work out how to make using Euphoria a joy for all programmers.

Shian_Lee said...

Answers as: look at the editors list, tools list, and take a patch from here and combine it with a patch from there - is an immature and pathetic strategy.

Can you please give precise examples of what you mean. I'm having some trouble in understanding what exactly is your issues with it. I can't comment on the "immature and pathetic" slur until I understand what you are referring to.

Shian_Lee said...

The target users for an easy-to-use-all-purpose-language must be EVERYONE to succeed. User should play with the language and enjoy it. If one of 100 users will become a serious programmer it's enough. Users should create their own "fun clubs" for the language. Unexperienced users should get excited from the language after writing "hello world!". The language should reach the people.

And what exactly is preventing people from doing this with Euphoria?

Shian_Lee said...

Euphoria is too arrogant. and that's what blocking its popularity.

Can you show me evidence of this "arrogance"? Maybe its just that you and I are using the word differently.

Shian_Lee said...

Please wake up: Euphoria should be friendly for 15 years old teens to become popular. MS$ invested a fortune to make their products friendly - just to make them popular.

Do you happen to have a fortune available to invest in Euphoria? I don't.

Shian_Lee said...

Now that Euphoria 3 is mature, and Euphoria 4 is great - it's about time to invest effort on making it friendly. Those who criticized the importance of Euphoria IDE are blind and misleading. MS$ invested from QBASIC to "Visual Studio" billions because you cannot gain popularity by targeting your products to old users. Only the young users can make it. MS$ knows it.

Again, why do you think that "old users" are the only ones being catered for? I really can't see it myself and I'd appreciate some help in understanding what exactly it is that you see.

Shian_Lee said...

Why Euphoria is so arrogant??? Is Euphoria has some kind of feelings of inferiority? Euphoria isn't C++ - that's the great thing! Euphoria isn't Basic - that's also the great thing! Why targeting Euphoria to professionals by introducing the language with vocabulary that new users never heard about?

Excuse me if I'm jumping to conclusions, but I'm pretty sure you have taken the effort to learn more than one human language. When first starting to learn, did you know that there was an enormous vocabulary that you'd potentially have to learn? Did that put you off trying? Did the existence of 'hard' words and idioms prevent you from learning the easy ones first? I bet that at the beginning, there were words that you didn't even knew existed - idioms that you'd never heard about. Was that a problem for you?

There is nothing in Euphoria that forces a newcomer to use the 'advanced' aspects of the language. One can happily write programs using only the simpler parts of the language, and as one learns more about its capabilities, one can choose to use different parts of the language, if they so desire. But you are not pushed into it.

Or are you suggesting that Euphoria ONLY cater for beginner programmers. That is rhetorical because I know already that that's not what you believe. But it could be one of the consequences of not allowing Euphoria to expand its capabilities; not allowing different styles of coding and algorithm expression.

Shian_Lee said...

It's fine to add struct to Euphoria - lots of experienced programmers might be benefit from it. But don't fool yourselves that it will gain any popularity to this language, because popularity is gained by young and fresh people - not by middle age professionals.

I talk too much but this is really annoying. Non of the developers seem to understand the evolution of popularity - it always starts from young and unexperienced people - which Euphoria ignores deliberately.

By the time I started learning Euphoria, I was already an old and very experienced programmer. I've been in the business since the early 1970s. And yet, I managed quite well in becoming excited by the language. I only mention this to show that it is not ONLY young and inexperienced people that can jump onto a new thing.

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27. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

Shian_Lee said...
DerekParnell said...

Well I suggest you quickly join the development team

All I am trying to do is to help, from respect to your hard and great work.

Why not join the dev team and help out even more? Even first time programmers are welcome to join the team.

And of course, Euphoria is largely written in Euphoria itself - so you can help develop the language while honing your Euphoria skills at the same time!

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28. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

replay to DerekParnell

first, thank you.

I got an answer for each issue. in some of the issues I meant one thing and you understood another thing - so these issues I must explain more clearly and give you the examples you asked for, especially the 'vocabulary' issue - I actually totally meant something else.

I have to move now. I'll try to answer as soon as possible.

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29. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

jimcbrown said...
Shian_Lee said...
DerekParnell said...

Well I suggest you quickly join the development team

All I am trying to do is to help, from respect to your hard and great work.

Why not join the dev team and help out even more? Even first time programmers are welcome to join the team.

And of course, Euphoria is largely written in Euphoria itself - so you can help develop the language while honing your Euphoria skills at the same time!

Actually... I was dreaming about programming in Euphoria and help the team - it's much more interesting then what I've done before. At the moment it's a bit hard to find time from obvious reasons. I actually live in a war zone, and life here are not stable.

Thank you. I got to move now.

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30. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

Shian_Lee said...

The biggest mistake, in my opinion, of Euphoria developers, is to target the language to experienced programmers. i.e.: being not realistic.

...

By ignoring young and not experience programmers - Euphoria actually blocked its future. Why can't you all understand it?

...

Now that Euphoria 3 is mature, and Euphoria 4 is great - it's about time to invest effort on making it friendly. Those who criticized the importance of Euphoria IDE are blind and misleading. MS$ invested from QBASIC to "Visual Studio" billions because you cannot gain popularity by targeting your products to old users. Only the young users can make it. MS$ knows it.

I haven't really thought of it that way before, but you bring up some good points. I have always felt like the euphoria language itself is wonderful, but it is difficult to learn how to actually run, bind, translate, generate documentation from creole-syntax comments, etc. because of a lack of GUI-based tools. I understand many people (mostly Linux users) are used to command consoles and have no problem with them, but I find them quite intimidating.

<rant>Even though I have used computers since ~1990, starting with Commodore 128 BASIC and then QBASIC, I am STILL really bad at using the command console, on Windows or Linux. I hate typing commands! I can never seem to remember what commands to type, and what combination of -psandqs I'm supposed to type after them. And why should I have to type commands on a computer has a billion times more processing power required to display a stupid blinking cursor and sit there waiting for me to type something perfectly from memory instead doing the work for me in a fraction of a second with the click of the mouse!?</rant>

I understand the need to have a fall-back to command console sometimes, but a GUI is so much more intuitive, efficient, and easy to figure out how to use. People might be more interested in Euphoria if they could see that it has a complete graphical IDE that does everything we need:

  • Write code with context-sensitive help
  • Jump to file/line number of error
  • Visually build GUI code
  • Run, bind or translate program
  • Edit icons to apply to exes
  • Generate documentation from source creole-syntax comments
  • Browse documentation within included source files

I'm not just bringing this up, expecting someone out there to do this some day...I am actually working on possible solution, but it will probably take a few more months to finish the first release.

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31. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

ryanj said...

I haven't really thought of it that way before, but you bring up some good points. I have always felt like the euphoria language itself is wonderful, but it is difficult to learn how to actually run, bind, translate, generate documentation from creole-syntax comments, etc. because of a lack of GUI-based tools. I understand many people (mostly Linux users) are used to command consoles and have no problem with them, but I find them quite intimidating.

Thank you.

...Lately I asked a friend (51 years old) to help me with a project. He graduated university in math and computers.

He said: I'll use C#, Java, etc - I said: no time. It's my project. Only Euphoria. He was upset but was willing to try.

I could not believe that typing: "eui shians_project.ex" will break our partnership...! In university he used only visual studio...

He told me that Euphoria is useless....(???) can you believe? just because he had to type few letters on the console. In university they don't teach this stuff anymore.

I told him that Euphoria can describe 100 Java objects in a single sequence, and that he's talking nonsense. But... without Euphoria IDE he wouldn't even listen to me. Actually he was angry at me that I didn't tell him from the beginning that there's no IDE with help system.

For many new programmers the IDE seems to be the language itself. MS$ did its best to reach this situation. but now it is a fact.

Personally, I cannot find anyone to help me with Euphoria project - unless I'll supply them an Euphoria IDE. Actually no one here is willing to study Euphoria because of it.

For the new programmers the terminal's name (whichever terminal) is: "DOS". and they are not willing to use "DOS" anymore. I know that it sounds stupid.

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32. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

Since your friend is a math graduate, ask him how he knows that his Visual Studio project always produces 100% correct code.

After all, if he were writing a program - for example - to handle the payroll for a few thousand people, he would be required to prove that the math was correct. Let him explain how he can do that without seeing the code.

"Lookie at the pretty windows" won't cut it when management does a code review.

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33. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

DerekParnell said...
Shian_Lee said...

The biggest mistake, in my opinion, of Euphoria developers, is to target the language to experienced programmers. i.e.: being not realistic.

I do not think that the developers are targeting the language to any group in particular. What evidence can you present that leads you to your conclusion?

Answer: Euphoria is quite an unknown language. you can google for it. it's a fact. Those who actually understand the benefits of Euphoria are usually already programmers. The developers are actually targeting the language to specific group by NOT targeting the language to other groups. "NOT" is the keyword here.

Shian_Lee said...

A programming language is like a baby. Baby don't born at the age of 21 years old.

By ignoring young and not experience programmers - Euphoria actually blocked its future. Why can't you all understand it?

Why do you think that inexperienced programmers are being ignored?

And do you think that Euphoria should also cater for the needs of programmers, regardless of their level of experience?

Answer: because for reaching inexperienced programmers, a different approach must be used: you should supply them ready-to-use and easy-to-use tools. They still don't know what is a byte.

Yes. Euphoria should also cater for the needs of programmers. for the same reason that Linux/GNU/MATE needs to cater for the needs of its users: To be popular, to be known, to get more attention, to get more donations, to survive, and to get the place that it deserves - high.

    • *
Shian_Lee said...

For example, how would you all feel if I'll take you to a Tea Kwon Do lesson and expect from you to practice jump hook kick on the first day? - you would all break your backs and be rushed to hospital.

What you're doing is deliberately ignoring young and unexperienced programmers.

In my opinion, you are mistaken with your assessment of Euphoria, and I'd like to know why you think this so that we can work out how to make using Euphoria a joy for all programmers.

Answer: 20 years ago+/-, QuickBasic 4.5 presented unique concept: you could choose "easy menus" or "advanced menus". MS$ programmers realized, from the beginning, that they must supply different set of tools for beginners and professionals. i.e. while you and me cannot live without the command line - new users cannot live with it. then why not let them press F5 instead of typing "eui hello.ex"? After pressing F5 for 10000 times, maybe they will feel more confidence to use the "black hole" (the command line).

Shian_Lee said...

Answers as: look at the editors list, tools list, and take a patch from here and combine it with a patch from there - is an immature and pathetic strategy.

Can you please give precise examples of what you mean. I'm having some trouble in understanding what exactly is your issues with it. I can't comment on the "immature and pathetic" slur until I understand what you are referring to.

Answer: "immature and pathetic" is not a slur. I respect all of you; that's why I allow my self to talk like this. All of the developers are obviously very intelligent and can read between the words. So please don't get me wrong. I am talking about a strategy. A strategy that will "touch the heart" of new and young programmers. This is about psychology, not just programming. People like visual things. To make Euphoria popular you must consider this fact, and create for them a visual environment - instead of documents. Documents are not bestsellers. that's all. specially for young programmers. They like to see some impressive results before reading a lot. They like desktops and IDE's. Don't get me wrong again: personally I am addicted to the command line.

Shian_Lee said...

The target users for an easy-to-use-all-purpose-language must be EVERYONE to succeed. User should play with the language and enjoy it. If one of 100 users will become a serious programmer it's enough. Users should create their own "fun clubs" for the language. Unexperienced users should get excited from the language after writing "hello world!". The language should reach the people.

And what exactly is preventing people from doing this with Euphoria?

Answer: the process of downloading, then setting EUDIR then setting EUINC, then adding /bin to the path, then get a basic idea what is the correct syntax of cd (change dir), then maybe export EUDIR in /.profile, etc - just to be able to run "hello world", is hard for people that never used the "black hole" before. For you and me it all looks fun. for new programmers it might be a nightmare. - Let them write 'puts(1, "hello world!")' and press F5 first. Let them enjoy Euphoria before they have to read the user manual for Xterm, bash or CMD. Let them enjoy. then the language will become popular. These days many users don't have any idea what CMD is for. I guess you must know that.

Shian_Lee said...

Euphoria is too arrogant. and that's what blocking its popularity.

Can you show me evidence of this "arrogance"? Maybe its just that you and I are using the word differently.

Answer: the answer is simple. Euphoria started long time ago. at those days everybody used the "black hole". These days new programmers afraid to be vanished into the "black hole". But Euphoria laughs at their fears. Again: I think that it's ridiculous that people don't use the command line, but it's the reality. New programmers will have to know the command line soon or later, but it's better that they'll start to use Euphoria straight away and learn the command line and the OS characteristics later, more slowly, side by side with Euphoria.

Shian_Lee said...

Please wake up: Euphoria should be friendly for 15 years old teens to become popular. MS$ invested a fortune to make their products friendly - just to make them popular.

Do you happen to have a fortune available to invest in Euphoria? I don't.

Answer: MS$ needs a fortune because every 2 years they distribute their same products in another suit. i.e. what's the big advantage of MS-Access 2013 over MS-Access 2000? - no big advantage; it simply wearing a different suit. a very expensive suit. Euphoria developers need the time to create an IDE for Euphoria, to gain popularity for the language. Of course this time is precious for many other things. But that's all it takes: time. Because I know by fact that the developers of Euphoria are extremely talented. So, we don't need a fortune.

Shian_Lee said...

Now that Euphoria 3 is mature, and Euphoria 4 is great - it's about time to invest effort on making it friendly. Those who criticized the importance of Euphoria IDE are blind and misleading. MS$ invested from QBASIC to "Visual Studio" billions because you cannot gain popularity by targeting your products to old users. Only the young users can make it. MS$ knows it.

Again, why do you think that "old users" are the only ones being catered for? I really can't see it myself and I'd appreciate some help in understanding what exactly it is that you see.

Answer: the "old users" know how to use the black hole. that's all. I am sure that you can read between the words as well.

Shian_Lee said...

Why Euphoria is so arrogant??? Is Euphoria has some kind of feelings of inferiority? Euphoria isn't C++ - that's the great thing! Euphoria isn't Basic - that's also the great thing! Why targeting Euphoria to professionals by introducing the language with vocabulary that new users never heard about?

Excuse me if I'm jumping to conclusions, but I'm pretty sure you have taken the effort to learn more than one human language. When first starting to learn, did you know that there was an enormous vocabulary that you'd potentially have to learn? Did that put you off trying? Did the existence of 'hard' words and idioms prevent you from learning the easy ones first? I bet that at the beginning, there were words that you didn't even knew existed - idioms that you'd never heard about. Was that a problem for you?

There is nothing in Euphoria that forces a newcomer to use the 'advanced' aspects of the language. One can happily write programs using only the simpler parts of the language, and as one learns more about its capabilities, one can choose to use different parts of the language, if they so desire. But you are not pushed into it.

Or are you suggesting that Euphoria ONLY cater for beginner programmers. That is rhetorical because I know already that that's not what you believe. But it could be one of the consequences of not allowing Euphoria to expand its capabilities; not allowing different styles of coding and algorithm expression.

Answer: sorry you misunderstood my meaning. I was not talking about the Euphoria *language* - which is the most friendly that exist. I was taking about the words that a new programmer have to face when first installing and using Euphoria. For example: export EUDIR in /.profile. Please understand that these days many Linux users, that wish to try this great language, Euphoria, don't know what is 'export', PATH, set, bash, etc. And bash is million times more complicated then Euphoria. 'bash' is not a forgiving friend. you can try whole day to understand what's wrong with your 2 lines of bash code - but if you're not experienced, it's impossible. the bash syntax antique, and the new programmer never heard about such thing as login sessions.

It's better to hide this stuff from a beginner, and let the IDE check and take care of these things. imagine a new programmer, adding export $PATH just after exit command... he will end up killing him self. and for beginner in programming - 'exit' means nothing but an optional way out, if he actually noticed it.

    • *
Shian_Lee said...

It's fine to add struct to Euphoria - lots of experienced programmers might be benefit from it. But don't fool yourselves that it will gain any popularity to this language, because popularity is gained by young and fresh people - not by middle age professionals.

I talk too much but this is really annoying. Non of the developers seem to understand the evolution of popularity - it always starts from young and unexperienced people - which Euphoria ignores deliberately.

By the time I started learning Euphoria, I was already an old and very experienced programmer. I've been in the business since the early 1970s. And yet, I managed quite well in becoming excited by the language. I only mention this to show that it is not ONLY young and inexperienced people that can jump onto a new thing.

Answer: the old people know the correct way to fight and win. but the young people should climb the walls and hold the spears.

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34. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

irv said...

Since your friend is a math graduate, ask him how he knows that his Visual Studio project always produces 100% correct code.

After all, if he were writing a program - for example - to handle the payroll for a few thousand people, he would be required to prove that the math was correct. Let him explain how he can do that without seeing the code.

"Lookie at the pretty windows" won't cut it when management does a code review.

My friend is an idiot. sorry.

And that's why I don't like Visual Studio now, and I didn't like VBDOS 20 years ago.

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35. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

I'm the same age (almost 45) and started with Applesoft and Commodore BASIC too. I've never understood IDEs even though I keep trying. I have no problems using a basic text editor and the command line.

Obviously, your mileage may vary.

Euphoria is not unique in not having an IDE; I would say fewer than 10% of the available languages have one and must have programs written in standard text editors. A few more languages have REPLs, which is nice. An even newer development which would also be nice would be an online "playground" like some languages have.

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36. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

Shian_Lee said...

Now that Euphoria 3 is mature, and Euphoria 4 is great - it's about time to invest effort on making it friendly.

Amen.

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37. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

jaygade said...

I'm the same age (almost 45) and started with Applesoft and Commodore BASIC too. I've never understood IDEs even though I keep trying. I have no problems using a basic text editor and the command line.

Obviously, your mileage may vary.

Euphoria is not unique in not having an IDE; I would say fewer than 10% of the available languages have one and must have programs written in standard text editors. A few more languages have REPLs, which is nice. An even newer development which would also be nice would be an online "playground" like some languages have.

Command line, REPLs, playground - can be compared to GWBASIC, which personally I really liked - but it's NOT rapid, and Euphoria is a rapid language that needs rapid tools.

One may feel comfortable using just a text editor - only if he knows how to use the command line and only if he understand the basic characteristics of the operating system, such as the file system and I/O. New/young/inexperienced programmers do not, and should not, study these things just for writing "hello world!" program. it takes time to grow.

In these modern times, desktops and IDEs is what young people understand; back in the 90s young people understood command lines. To make Euphoria popular you must understand how young people are thinking these days; many of them never ever used a command line and they will not use it in school or academy.

If fewer than 10% of the available languages include IDE - it's a lot! After all, how many languages are popular or useful for all purposes? I was programming PLC's. I can tell you that these days you cannot find a PLC without really-impressive IDE - and there are numerous PLCs these days. If Basic, C, and Java having their own IDE's - then Euphoria must have as well! or you may suggest that Euphoria is less powerful and useful then those popular languages?

Those who underestimate Euphoria - will block its future and popularity. The same thing for Linux OS or anything else.

I am sure that you and me will continue to use all kinds of text editors and command lines; but the issue here is the future and popularity of Euphoria - not our personal taste.

If you leave Euphoria without IDE, while Basic, C and Java do have their own IDEs - then you underestimate Euphoria, and will gain no popularity from the young people these days.

For example, unlike the 90s, all industrial PLCs these days are shipped with free and very impressive IDE, which supports from 2 to 4 programming languages for PLCs. Writing communication protocols using a text editor is something I've done in the 90s - now, it's history.

IDE is not a spaceship; it's not supposed to be so complicated! it's the right investment for the future of Euphoria. And Euphoria should always remain Euphoria, i.e. anyone can use command line and text editor if they wish to.

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38. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

Shian_Lee said...
jaygade said...

I'm the same age (almost 45) and started with Applesoft and Commodore BASIC too. I've never understood IDEs even though I keep trying. I have no problems using a basic text editor and the command line.

Obviously, your mileage may vary.

Euphoria is not unique in not having an IDE; I would say fewer than 10% of the available languages have one and must have programs written in standard text editors. A few more languages have REPLs, which is nice. An even newer development which would also be nice would be an online "playground" like some languages have.

Command line, REPLs, playground - can be compared to GWBASIC, which personally I really liked - but it's NOT rapid, and Euphoria is a rapid language that needs rapid tools.

One may feel comfortable using just a text editor - only if he knows how to use the command line and only if he understand the basic characteristics of the operating system, such as the file system and I/O. New/young/inexperienced programmers do not, and should not, study these things just for writing "hello world!" program. it takes time to grow.

In these modern times, desktops and IDEs is what young people understand; back in the 90s young people understood command lines. To make Euphoria popular you must understand how young people are thinking these days; many of them never ever used a command line and they will not use it in school or academy.

If fewer than 10% of the available languages include IDE - it's a lot! After all, how many languages are popular or useful for all purposes? I was programming PLC's. I can tell you that these days you cannot find a PLC without really-impressive IDE - and there are numerous PLCs these days. If Basic, C, and Java having their own IDE's - then Euphoria must have as well! or you may suggest that Euphoria is less powerful and useful then those popular languages?

Those who underestimate Euphoria - will block its future and popularity. The same thing for Linux OS or anything else.

I am sure that you and me will continue to use all kinds of text editors and command lines; but the issue here is the future and popularity of Euphoria - not our personal taste.

If you leave Euphoria without IDE, while Basic, C and Java do have their own IDEs - then you underestimate Euphoria, and will gain no popularity from the young people these days.

For example, unlike the 90s, all industrial PLCs these days are shipped with free and very impressive IDE, which supports from 2 to 4 programming languages for PLCs. Writing communication protocols using a text editor is something I've done in the 90s - now, it's history.

IDE is not a spaceship; it's not supposed to be so complicated! it's the right investment for the future of Euphoria. And Euphoria should always remain Euphoria, i.e. anyone can use command line and text editor if they wish to.

Somewhat off topic, but Allen-Bradley, Siemens, Omron - some of the biggest names in PLCs, none have a free IDE.

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39. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

Anyone else notice that Microsoft just announced that Visual Studio is now open source and cross-platform?
Forked into: [OT] Microsoft takes .NET open source and cross-platform

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40. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

evanmars said...

Somewhat off topic, but Allen-Bradley, Siemens, Omron - some of the biggest names in PLCs, none have a free IDE.

Then I'm sorry for the wrong info. But the strong competition in this market will eventually force them to give the IDE for free. Korean LS, for example, and other far east products, will eventually force them to; because LS gives you best quality with low price. It's just a matter of time till the European market will surrender to the east.

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41. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

Shian_Lee said...

A strategy that will "touch the heart" of new and young programmers.

What I'm working on right now might address some of your issues. I'll say no more, but it probably won't be ready for Christmas sad.

Pete

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42. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

petelomax said...
Shian_Lee said...

A strategy that will "touch the heart" of new and young programmers.

What I'm working on right now might address some of your issues. I'll say no more, but it probably won't be ready for Christmas sad.

Pete

Is it something related to Phix or to Euphoria itself?

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43. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

petelomax said...
Shian_Lee said...

A strategy that will "touch the heart" of new and young programmers.

What I'm working on right now might address some of your issues. I'll say no more, but it probably won't be ready for Christmas sad.

Pete

That's the spirit!

Thank you.

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44. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

GreenEuphorian said...

Is it something related to Phix or to Euphoria itself?

Hmmm. Shall I stick with my own little baby, my pride and joy, or should I dump it in the bin and go off wi... I think you know the answer to that.

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45. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

petelomax said...
GreenEuphorian said...

Is it something related to Phix or to Euphoria itself?

Hmmm. Shall I stick with my own little baby, my pride and joy, or should I dump it in the bin and go off wi... I think you know the answer to that.

Pete, probably you already know what many people on this forum are thinking: why don't you come back to Euphoria and integrate the changes and improvements you have been working on into Euphoria? This way you would lose nothing, because your contributions will be credited to you, and Euphoria would gain everything. The best of both worlds.

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46. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

GreenEuphorian said...
petelomax said...
GreenEuphorian said...

Is it something related to Phix or to Euphoria itself?

Hmmm. Shall I stick with my own little baby, my pride and joy, or should I dump it in the bin and go off wi... I think you know the answer to that.

Pete, probably you already know what many people on this forum are thinking: why don't you come back to Euphoria and integrate the changes and improvements you have been working on into Euphoria? This way you would lose nothing, because your contributions will be credited to you, and Euphoria would gain everything. The best of both worlds.

Some of us are in fact trying to do this. It is technically difficult though, as Phix is an independent source code base, not a fork of the RDS code... Still, Phix has some really good ideas, things I think that OpenEuphoria could certainly use.

The way I see it, Phix is part of the broader Euphoria community. So, by virtue of this fact, any gains or benefits made by Phix is also automatically a gain or benefit made to the broader Euphoria community as a whole.

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47. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

jimcbrown said...
GreenEuphorian said...
petelomax said...
GreenEuphorian said...

Is it something related to Phix or to Euphoria itself?

Hmmm. Shall I stick with my own little baby, my pride and joy, or should I dump it in the bin and go off wi... I think you know the answer to that.

Pete, probably you already know what many people on this forum are thinking: why don't you come back to Euphoria and integrate the changes and improvements you have been working on into Euphoria? This way you would lose nothing, because your contributions will be credited to you, and Euphoria would gain everything. The best of both worlds.

Some of us are in fact trying to do this. It is technically difficult though, as Phix is an independent source code base, not a fork of the RDS code... Still, Phix has some really good ideas, things I think that OpenEuphoria could certainly use.

The way I see it, Phix is part of the broader Euphoria community. So, by virtue of this fact, any gains or benefits made by Phix is also automatically a gain or benefit made to the broader Euphoria community as a whole.

It would be a massive gain for the Euphoria community if Pete himself decided re-join it, because he is a very talented developer. Is there something we can do to woo you back, Pete?

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48. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

GreenEuphorian said...

It would be a massive gain for the Euphoria community if Pete himself decided re-join it, because he is a very talented developer. Is there something we can do to woo you back, Pete?

Actually, I'm quite glad that Pete has put so much effort into keeping Phix alive and relevant.

And yes, I say this even after noting that for more than the past 6 months, Shawn has been the only one developing OpenEuphoria: http://scm.openeuphoria.org/hg/euphoria/

With the new Linux/GNU port, and the addition of multithreading, Phix has become more exciting than ever. http://openeuphoria.org/forum/m/129591.wc http://openeuphoria.org/forum/m/129046.wc

An extra nice feature of Phix development is that there's zero C code - the only langauge needed to make Phix is Phix. Whereas, one typically does quite a bit of C hacking when developing OE...

As Shawn is effectively the only one working on OE development now, both projects are now both developed by one-person teams.

OE might be ahead in one or two minor aspects, but I suspect Phix will catch up in good time. We might even come to a point where we drop the current OE codebase and adopt Phix instead.....

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49. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

I'll note that with Shawn's recent fixes http://scm.openeuphoria.org/hg/euphoria/rev/490db928fa10 and http://scm.openeuphoria.org/hg/euphoria/rev/77461ca5af3a we are now closer to the end line.

We have only one major bug left holding up the 4.1.0 release http://openeuphoria.org/ticket/index.wc?per_page=20&page=1&type_id=1&category_id=-1&milestone=4.1.0&severity_id=4&status_id=-1&user_id=-1&actiontype=Filter / http://openeuphoria.org/ticket/933.wc and no blocking bugs http://openeuphoria.org/ticket/index.wc?per_page=20&page=1&type_id=1&category_id=-1&milestone=4.1.0&severity_id=5&status_id=-1&user_id=-1&actiontype=Filter

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50. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

jimcbrown said...

We might even come to a point where we drop the current OE codebase and adopt Phix instead.....

I've long considered re-basing Euphoria on LLVM. It'd be quite a lot of work but the payoff would be huge.

-Greg

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51. Re: Euphoria isn't dying - just needs a jolly good kick!

jaygade said...

I'm the same age (almost 45) and started with Applesoft and Commodore BASIC too. I've never understood IDEs even though I keep trying. I have no problems using a basic text editor and the command line.

Obviously, your mileage may vary.

Euphoria is not unique in not having an IDE; I would say fewer than 10% of the available languages have one and must have programs written in standard text editors. A few more languages have REPLs, which is nice. An even newer development which would also be nice would be an online "playground" like some languages have.

Im 20 years old, started with C at 11, passed by Java, Visual Basic .NET, and some others, like the web langs (JS, PHP), Lua, perl, shell script, etc.

I began to really enjoy programming after learned assembly. Im not obsessed with speed or binary size. (I care about these things, but im not a "shiite") Its just that with it i could truly understand what im doing, and the cognitive load of "jmp eax" is smaller that of "(addr*)();".

But assembly isnt ever what i need. Portability isnt my major concern. Developing GUIs, TUIs, web apps and interfacing with other's libraries are more like a challenge for me.

Im not stating that im super skilled, because im not! Im a begginer in many ways. Never had a employ with programming, nor worked as a freelancer, nor contributed before with open source projects. Im accoustumed with many modern technics, i ever write tests to all my code, but my code havent passed by sufficient eyes to receive criticism. I hadnt worked in teams. Nor graduate in the area. Im doing engineering, programming its a desirable/necessary skill, not so needed like math, thats all.

I was needed of a better higher level lang, a trampoline for my prototypes and ideas, to permit me a faster and easier devel. I often found myself writing a lot of scripts to test concepts, and then rewriting them in other langs. Shell script and JS do only their job, no more. Then i found Euphoria and felt lucky!

I think, maybe the Euphoria lang could work as a brigde between the beginner and the advanced knowledge of a experienced programmer. A plataform that hold the beginner by hand, and let him meet the "black hole" in a friendlier experience. Maybe a customized Geany instalation could fullfil the IDE role for the beginner, with that VT at bottom playing a mixed REPL/shell role.

A plataform for games, for education, and a shiny excelent toolbox for the average people. A similar role played by Basic in the old days, like of enlarged, with a better/modern aproach?

I hope im not too deluded!

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