Visual Programming, mTropolis, Chipwits and Revolution

Richard Gaskin ambassador at fourthworld.com
Sat Dec 3 19:11:19 EST 2005


Greg Smith wrote:
 > Programming is an exhausting pastime, and an even more exhausting
 > occupation.  Just look at some of these guys after 30 years of it,
 > if they last that long. (Please post your photos, here).

The photos are at:
<http://www.frappr.com/runtimerevolution>

The folks there look like they're having a good time.  The only 
crazy-looking person there is Bjoernke von Gierke, but we all know he's 
a madman anyway. :)  (great pic, Bjoernke)

For some of us programming is a meditation, a relaxing departure from 
more complicated and harried tasks like driving (maybe I've been in LA 
too long <g>).

I was talking with Ken the other day about this, and he and I agreed 
that if we found ourselves doing pretty much the same thing in ten years 
  we'd probably still be having a very good time.


 > I am convinced that visually oriented people are never going to
 > buy into textual, (with lots of abbreviations), representations
 > of visual things.  Or, rather, they may buy into it, but they
 > will hate every moment of it.

Visual artist Scott Rossi seems to do okay, but his personality may be 
as rare as his talents.

I've had a keen interest in iconic programming systems since their 
heyday back in the early '90s.  I have a folder here chock full o' 
screenshots from them, and periodically daydream about having the time 
to make yet another contribution to that pool.

But what stops me is recognizing that very few of them exist today, and 
none are wildly popular.  It may well be the case that JavaScript, ugly 
as that bastardized half-baked language is, is used by more people today 
than the sum of all people who've ever used iconic systems.

This seems counterintuitive, and is as disappointing to me as it may be 
to you.  Back in the day I held great hope for iconic programming, and 
once believed it to be the future for "inventive users".  Given how 
history has played out I'm not so sure today.

Shortly after Bill Appleton first released his SuperCard, in an 
interview I did with him for a regional magazine I asked him about 
iconic programming, since his previous product was CourseBuilder.  He 
said that while iconic programming had a lot of value for simple things, 
to do anything complex meant creating diagrams that were difficult to 
read, and that ultimately a substantial program like even a basic text 
editor would be as hard to read expressed purely visually as it would be 
in textual code.

I agree that programming isn't for everyone.  Some like it, some don't, 
like any other human activity.  But if you like it, it ain't bad at all; 
on the contrary, it can be very relaxing and deeply satisfying.

And if you prefer iconic systems, I'm enough of an optimist to believe 
the jury's still out.  I think there's always room for more inventions, 
and the contintual evolution of how humans tell computers what do to has 
only barely begun.

--
  Richard Gaskin
  Managing Editor, revJournal
  _______________________________________________________
  Rev tips, tutorials and more: http://www.revJournal.com





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