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. :)
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!
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. :)
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!
thisContext 