Comment by riotdash | Hacker News Reader

Comment by riotdash | Hacker News Reader

There have been tons of "graphical programming" languages and IDEs trying to pull it off for the last 15 years and pretty much all them have been total shit.

This doesn't look any different. Someone already said it, but the fundamental problem with these are that it's extremely hard to build big and complex software without making it look like a huge mess. In a normal programming you can always call any part of code and make any number of instances and put them almost anywhere you want with very simple, logical and linear code which is executed in a normal standard prodecure (= line after another). With this almost everytime you make some changes you'd have to rethink the whole program flow and move all the components/blocks to different places and there are millions of lines going all around the place.

1/10, will fail.

...the fundamental problem with these are that it's extremely hard to build big and complex software without making it look like a huge mess...

In my view, text based languages could be this way too, except that the habits of making code at least marginally readable (e.g., indentation) and modular (subroutines, local variables, etc.) are drilled into everybody who learns programming, or learned through "the apprenticeship of observation."

Also, those habits require only a bare minimum of physical effort, such as reaching for the tab button or enclosing some code in a function definition.

I think a problem with graphical programming is the sheer physical effort that it requires, encouraging sloppy work. Maintaining readable code as it grows in complexity is a major chore, involving physical and not just mental, effort. In practice it doesn't happen.

That's a lot of snark for someone making such a broad generalization. Look at a program called Houdini and it's shading language. It is domain specific but includes branching and loops. The interface uses openGL and is extremely fluid. If that wasn't enough, it is live, so while you are working you can see your results in real time. You can use it to manipulate geometry, images, sound / animation, as well as the original purpose of writing shaders. That visual programming IDE has been enormously successful.

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