Something I keep seeing, that’s bugging me: People suggesting that some limitation is acceptable or understandable, because of what Codea “is”. “Oh, Codea is for demos, not that”. “Codea? That’s for games”. “Codea is for prototyping, not for real apps”.
Nonsense.
Codea is a tool. It is for what you use it for. It may not be well suited for particular tasks, yet - but that doesn’t mean we should shrug our shoulders and accept it, and move on.
Here’s what Codea IS: It’s Lua, a language designed to get around limitations imposed from the outside, with an Editor, designed to get around limitations of the ipad, and some libraries designed to get around limitations of the stock libraries. It’s whole reason to exist is to do things you couldn’t do before.
Don’t let your imagination be limited.
Back in the Bad Old Days, I had an 8-bit Atari Computer. People said “Atari? That’s for games.” - and we heard that, and wrote ham radio interfaces, and industrial controllers, and teleprompters, and spreadsheets, and yes, played a lot of games. When someone tells you that a computing interface is “for” something or other - show them the light.
When Codea was first released - no fonts, no text output other than print. So what did we do? We made it. Codea wasn’t for text output - so we did text output. Now, it’s built-in. What’s next? I don’t know. But I do know that limiting our vision to what Codea is currently “for” is a self-fulfilling prophecy.
I’ve had Codea for a couple of weeks having seen an article about it, and decided I wanted to have a crack at learning to code. Although I know very very little about programming, codea’s accessibility and simple interface have inspired me to learn. Many thanks to you guys for making such a great app, and a very large improvement in the new update (I don’t get how to use all that stuff yet, but give me time lol!).
I agree that Codea can be everything but if I mention it’s for prototyping that is more a statement on my perceived priority on what order new features will get worked on.
Codea will do everything someday. I just hope improvements stop before it turns into Visual Basic. The old visual basic was great and limited, the new visual basic is wrecked. There is no point to it and C# should be used instead for the shape that it is in which is why they decided to wreck it.
Codea for me is a high level programable language (like SCL for Siemens Plc systems) where I can program mathematical problems. With the graphical possibilities I can show (and simulate) as it was real.
Example;
Anti collision alarm of the both the cranes of the offshore barges of Heerema (Balder, Hermod and Thialf). I wrote this in he past for Siemens Plc systems. I rewrote this for Codea to check the correct functioning. With the possibility to show this graphically, with the alam limits as circles around the KeelPoints and BoomTips. Now I can check this on a more simple way. SlewAngles and BoomAngle are variables (iParameters), the rest as constants.
For me Codea is: I can program problems/solutions and use it as a kind of Scada system. Therefore inputting and displaying values on the screen is very important, as implemented in version 1.3
I think Codea is more then programming games, but I think (I’am sure) that programming games is more difficult then where I using it.
@hartland what is work for you would be a game for us. You may want to consider a dummed down/non proprietary and cuteified version of what you do. Look at FarmVille, farming is work and FarmVille teaches little, is simple, but enjoyed.
Now my work is mainly punting data from place to place, not very graphical which is why I do this for play.
Hi lpda41001,
The graphical presentation of both cranes are very simple, it is a top view, the booms are straight lines and the barge a rectangle. With iparameter I can adjust the slew and boom angles. This very simple presentation is only a way to see and check if the calculations in the collision alarm software are correct.
It’s not an imaginary presentation of cranes, sorry, no fun it all.
Sorry Bortels,
I mean that my graphical simple presentation had not the fun like a gaming program.
My fun is to program calculations and check the good working.
Yes, I have (and got) a lot of fun in my life. Specially my travels around the world (was my job) and the relationship with my offshore clients. I’am retired now, my fun now is my hobbies (old radio’s, model trains and mopeds), my dog, (and wive?), my life and, yes, to program Codea.
