I haven't tried CCW, but I am happy with Enclojure 6.8. (In 6.9 the file navigator which lists the functions and vars in the file doesn't work yet, and the navigator is perhaps 50% of the value I derive from an IDE.)
> Am 19.07.2010 um 20:50 schrieb Laurent PETIT: > > If you work from the files, then you simply do not save the files until > > you're "happy" with the codebase. I wouldn't want to have the REPL autoload anything just because I save a file, simply because most of the files I am editing are in a broken state most of the time, and could stay that way for days. Saving is something I do out of habit, because I'm going out for lunch, because I want access to the files from another tool (backup, version control, move to different editor or computer, whatever). I'm thinking of "save" as "save the text in this file" rather than "recompile and reload everything", I don't want "save" to give me exception stacktraces and a boatload of warnings. I once used a Java IDE that tried to recompile the project every time I saved. I never got used to that either and found it a constant nuisance. And it's even worse in a REPL-based language where a reload may mess up carefully arranged global state. I'm working similarly to Meikel, using the REPL for testing of simple draft/mock functions and using "evaulate expression" at least as often as "load file" - the file as a whole is broken and won't load, but I just finished this particular function and want to test it. I normally start out with a sketch or skeleton of the whole project, with multiple files and lots of partial drafts, and fill out the details over time (days or weeks). Being able to finish and test functions one by one is one of the great benefits of REPL-based development IMHO. I wouldn't want anything that forces me to have every file in a loadable state all the time. Perhaps relatedly, someone doing a usability study of how newspapers journalists work told me that journalists (at least the ones she were studying) didn't write articles by starting at the beginning and finishing at the end. Instead they wrote down snippets, sentence fragments, nifty turns of phrase etc. in whatever order they happened to think of them, spread the fragments out on the screen and copy/pasted the parts together to assemble a complete article. According to her this was a surprisingly efficient way of working, they could finish an article in no time compared to writing it in a more traditional start-to-finish fashion. Perhaps because the time you need to think of what to say about X can be spent to say something about Y. This is somewhat similar to my preferred way of working with code, I start out with a jumble of fragments and assemble them into complete code over time. The Java development style where you need the whole file (or even worse, the whole project) to compile in order to test a single method is a lot slower, at least for me. > a. So having an "IDE-dedicated live server REPL" seems like I > could relieve the user from explicitly launching a REPL (it's weird > and counter-intuitive for a user to have to somehow "manually" > trigger the IDE user assistance !). I can't tell. I have the REPL running 100% of the time I am using a Clojure IDE, so this is an issue I never encounter. But if you need a "server REPL" for internal reasons that's fine by me, as long as it doesn't mess with the REPL I am using. > I may still make the default behaviour be "automatically > reload", and for people wanting the maximum safety, "don't automatically > reload"). I'm perfectly fine with that :) For what I would like: * I would be happy to have a one-click option (button or keyboard shortcut) to reload everything that is currently loaded. * If there is some way to undefine vars that were loaded from file when the vars are deleted from the file and the file is reloaded, I think I would like that too. It would save many a REPL restart to check that newly refactored code doesn't depend on something that was deleted. (Although it might come back to bite me if I have overridden the file definition in the REPL and a reload removes both of them, I expect I would eventually learn not to avoid that.) Or perhaps a one-click manual "restart REPL and reload current files", somewhat analogous to a Java "clean and build". I should mention that my working habits were formed with Emacs and Allegro Common Lisp and a decade with various Java IDEs. We adjust to the tools we are using, at least to some extent, and people coming to Clojure from elsewhere may have different expectations. If we want to move the state of Clojure IDEs forward, we may have to break some expectations for people like me, and "but that's how we did it in X twenty years ago" is not a sufficient reason to keep something in and of itself. I don't think it is possible to please everyone simultaneously, so if you think you have a better idea and can find at least a few people who prefer it your way, I'd say go for it :) Thanks for raising the question, it will be interesting to see what comes out of it. jf -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Clojure" group. To post to this group, send email to clojure@googlegroups.com Note that posts from new members are moderated - please be patient with your first post. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to clojure+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/clojure?hl=en
