+10
Tagasi lükatud

Scripting Support

Hackadelic 14 aastat tagasi uuendaja Christof Deininger 9 aastat tagasi 6
There is a request elsewhere to implement AddOn support in CN, enabling techy users to create their own CN extensions. I'd like to complement that idea and suggest to put emphasis on user-level scripting. Not only is programming in a scripting language much more suited for end-users (compared to programming in C++, the language I assume CN is implemented in). It is also much easier to implement, given the variety of scripting engines readily available for embedding in a host application.

All in all, compared to a full-blown, native plugin support, a scripting feature will provide more value to more users sooner.

Of course, at some later point, a plugin system can follow, perhaps to allow for things that people can't do on script level.

As a scripting language, I'd suggest Python, because of it's particularly clean syntax and excellent support for all major programming styles (procedural, functional, object-oriented). It will suit both novice users and experts equally well. Downside: The run-time system, while just one DLL, is quite huge in size.

If you go for smaller run-time memory fingerprints, you may consider Lua, but Lua has a bias towards procedural programming style which might not scale well for bigger and more advanced endeavors.

JavaScript seems as an interesting choice, too, because it's so wide-spread. But then again, like Lua, it does not scale well for bigger and more advanced endeavors.

Vasta

Vasta
Tagasi lükatud
Closed due to inability to collect 10 votes for more than 2 years.
Thanks for your suggestion! It is really something to consider. I think that Python would be an excellent choice indeed. But I'm afraid that scripting support will bloat the program size more than a plugin system would. And I really want to keep CN small to stay away from the Evernote niche.
Well, how about providing a scripting engine in the form of a plugin then? I know a number of cool applications that do just that.

About your argument that scripting would bloat the app size: That is not really true. A Lua or JavaScript engine is generally leaner than a descent plugin system is. (Just look at Eclipse' plugin system, which is a "descent" one. ;-))

And if you count the size of plugins compared to the size of scripts, the scripts win hands down. This is a factor to consider, too. With an add-on system, the goal is to keep the core lightweight, but that also means that a real user would ultimately have to install a number of add-ons as well in order to gather up his desired functionality. (Again, look at Eclipse, or WordPress, or any other add-on-enabled application. They practically can't exist without their add-ons.) If the add-ons were scripts, each add-on would be only a fraction of the size of a plugin. The total program size a user has installed would be much less.

There is another aspect: PR!

If there was a scripting system in place right now, without the need to run (and probably install before) a full blown compiler suite / development environment, I would have already implemented the scripts for my most wanted extra functionality. And if there was an "add-on market", where I could upload those scripts, I would have done that, too. And I'm not an exception there for sure.

Reduce the hurdle to creating add-ons, make it easy to share them, and your code base and thus your application's value, as well as the buzz around it will explode. If you did that with C++-based plugins, you'd limit the user base who can contribute and slow down the whole process by a factor of at least 10. (In fact, I'm afraid it'd be more than 10, as I suspect the number of C++ developers is dramatically declining world-wide.)

How fast do you want your application to spread?
Sorry for the delayed reply. I agree with your arguments and will seriously consider adding some form of scripting support in the future, most probably as a plugin. But the problem is that there are lots of other tasks ahead in the pipeline ;)
Of course, it is totally up to you. But if I were in your shoes, I'd make scripting support TOP PRIORITY. That way, new features would be implemented *for* you, instead of *by* you. Not least, it's a position that will likely decrease the size of your task pipleline as well. ;-)
Vasta
Tagasi lükatud
Closed due to inability to collect 10 votes for more than 2 years.