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Naiad progress 2019-12-02: online team services

Posted in Caffeine, consulting, Context, livecoding, Naiad, Smalltalk, Spoon, SqueakJS with tags , , , , , , on 2 December 2019 by Craig Latta
Naiad keeps livecoders informed of their teammates activity, and remembers all history.

topology established

Naiad is Caffeine‘s live module system. The goal is to support live versioning of classes and methods as they are edited, from connected teams of developers using Smalltalk or JavaScript IDEs from web browsers and native apps. Naiad keeps each developer informed of events meaningful to their teams and work. It’s comparable to a mashup of GitHub and Slack, and will interoperate with them as well.

The current Naiad prototype uses a relay network of NodeJS servers, each with Caffeine running in a Web Worker thread, and each serving a set of Caffeine-based client IDEs, in web browsers and native apps. The workers keep track of class and method versions, system checkpoints, and teams, using the relays to broadcast events to clients. Clients can request various services of the workers, like joining teams and making checkpoints from object memory snapshots.

These two clients are connected to the same relay server. The client on the left created a new team, by sending a message to the relay’s worker. The worker created the team, and told the relay to notify all of its peers (clients and relays). For now, clients respond by inspecting the new team.

I’ve just made the first system checkpoint, and broadcast the first team event (the creation of a team). Eventually, Naiad will support events for several services, including team chatting and screen-sharing, history management, and application deployment. I’m still eager to hear what events and services you think you would want in a livecoding notification system; please let me know! I expect the first public release of this work to be part of the second 2019 solstice release, on 22 December.

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team livecoding features

Posted in Uncategorized with tags , , , , , , , , on 10 November 2019 by Craig Latta
What IDE information would you like to share with your teammates as you work?

Caffeine can now:

  • provide an IDE as a DOM element
  • provide an IDE as a Chrome DevTools panel
  • run headlessly in a web browser worker thread, NodeJS server worker thread, or NodeJS main thread.

We have all the components we need to connect teams of livecoders, sharing information from their IDEs as they work. What information would we like to share?

proactive conflict resolution

I’d like to share information that makes code integration easier, by spreading awareness of potential conflicts as soon as possible. Imagine, for example, that you’ve found a bug in a longstanding system method, and decide to start editing it. Before the commit of your change (which may still be days or weeks away), someone else on your team also happens to start editing that method. Wouldn’t it be nice to know that both of you are interested in changing the method?

If both of you are connected to a team network, your IDEs can notify each other when a potential conflict situation like this begins, and the two of you can resolve it through discussion. Such a feature could be vital in a team where responsibility for methods and classes is clearly and completely divided between authors.

The servers in this network can provide history services, too, acting as repositories of all the versions of methods and classes that have been committed by team members. This could aid in unit testing, sharing of works-in-progress, and deployment.

How would you use it?

How would you like to use such a system? How would your needs change when acting as a developer, or as a manager? I’m writing a specification now, and would love to hear your thoughts. Thanks!

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Caffeine updated for Pharo 7

Posted in Caffeine, consulting, Context, livecoding, Smalltalk, SqueakJS with tags , , , , , , on 29 September 2019 by Craig Latta
Pharo 7 running on the SqueakJS virtual machine in Chrome, debugged by Squeak in a DevTools panel

I’ve updated Caffeine to run Pharo 7; please try it out! There was one virtual machine bug (primitivePerformWithArguments wasn’t manipulating the stack correctly), and I had to turn off a few Pharo features (like libGit support, which uses LibC, something I haven’t faked in the virtual machine yet).

Many thanks to the Pharo hackers in the RMOD team at INRIA Lille, for hosting me at their sprint on Friday, 27 September 2019. It was great hanging out and coding with you all. We’ll get that Pharo Apple Watch screenshot soon. :)

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Exploring the Netflix player with the Caffeine Chrome extension

Posted in Caffeine, consulting, Context, livecoding, music, Smalltalk, SqueakJS with tags , , , , , , , , , , on 22 September 2019 by Craig Latta
debugging Better Call Saul with Caffeine

With the latest version of the Caffeine Chrome extension, you can run Caffeine in a Chrome DevTools panel, with access to all the Chrome debugging APIs. I’ve been using it to explore the Netflix video player, for an app I’m writing that enables the viewer to edit narratives by rearranging scenes.

From a quick look at the DOM element tree for the player, it’s apparent that it’s a React app. By following a reference chain from a user interface element (like the skip-forward button), through the bound “this” object of its click-event listener, I found the internal React properties for all the player’s UI elements, and all the player functions they use (for example, for seeking forward in a video).

With those functions in hand, I made a Netflix player class in Smalltalk, which can manipulate the Netflix player React app interactively from Smalltalk code. Other objects I made representing show elements (like scenes, episodes, seasons, and series) can use my player to compile analytic information about shows, and present them in different ways. For example, you could watch an episode of Better Call Saul consisting only of scenes that include a certain character, or that take place at a certain location, or with flashbacks placed in chronological order. This is for a webapp I’m writing called Arc.

I’m eager to see what else you explore using the Caffeine extension in the DevTools!

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Caffeine Chrome extension updated

Posted in Caffeine, consulting, Context, livecoding, music, Smalltalk, SqueakJS with tags , , , , , , on 18 September 2019 by Craig Latta
Caffeine running as a Chrome DevTools panel, debugging the Croquet Studios site, with Hydra graphics in the background.

I’ve updated the Caffeine Chrome extension in the Chrome Web Store. This version, 77.1, makes the entire Caffeine user interface available as a Chrome DevTools panel, and can access all of the Chrome APIs. With Hydra graphics support included, it’s the most convenient and geeky way to access Caffeine, perfect for your next Algorave. :)

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a Web UIs update

Posted in Caffeine, consulting, Context, livecoding, Naiad, Smalltalk, Spoon, SqueakJS with tags , , , , , , on 12 September 2019 by Craig Latta
livecoded Vue versions of the Smalltalk devtools

I’ve created working Vue versions of the traditional Smalltalk workspace and classes browser, livecoded in the web browser from the full Squeak IDE. These use the vue-draggable-resizable component as the basis of a window system, for dragging and resizing, and the vue-menu component for pop-up context menus. Third-party Vue components are loaded live from the network using http-vue-loader, avoiding all offline build steps (e.g., with webpack). Each Smalltalk devtool UI is expressed as a Vue “single-file component” and loaded live.

When enough of the Smalltalk devtools are available in this format, I can provide an initial Squeak object memory snapshot without the UI process and its supporting code, and without the relatively large bitmaps for the Display, drop-shadows, and fonts. This snapshot will be about two megabytes, down from the 35-megabyte original. (I also unloaded lots of other code in The Big Shakeout, including Etoys and Monticello). This will greatly improve Caffeine’s initial-page-load and snapshot times.

I’m also eager to develop other apps, like a proper GUI for the Chrome devtools, a better web browser tabs manager, and several end-user apps. Caffeine is becoming an interesting platform!

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livecoding VueJS with Caffeine

Posted in Appsterdam, Caffeine, consulting, Context, Smalltalk, Spoon, SqueakJS with tags , , , , , , , on 30 August 2018 by Craig Latta

Vue component

Livecoding Vue.js with Caffeine: using a self-contained third-party Vue component compiled live from the web, no offline build step.

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