As in, you can't do your job on a tiny screen, or you can't do all your work using a touch interface?

I would hate to have to use a touch interface to write code.

I used to play this app when I was bored: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.hackedapp

It had a cool keyboard that would only show words that are syntactically valid for the cursor position.

It probably would need some alterations for a real language, but it's a lot better than just a qwerty keyboard

Maybe no one‘s created a good touch interface for writing code yet. I feel like there’s actually opportunity to completely reinvent coding from something keyboard-focused to something more touch-friendly. At the very least for line of business apps anyway. There’s been lots of work done on visual programming system but they all seem to be centered on teaching children basic coding concepts, not actually getting stuff done in the workplace. But that doesn’t mean it’s impossible...

There was Visual Basic and FileMaker. That said I think non-trivial problems require a dense UI. And visual density can be daunting. Text and language are a hack but their the least bad I've seen so far.

Visual Basic got partway there by having WYSIWYG user interface editing, but you still had to code all of business logic using the visual basic programming language.

What I’m talking about is replacing the latter with something that is not just essentially a text string. Maybe one way to think about it is when you are coding in visual studio with a language that has good IntelliSense, it will pop up with various class members and other details because it understands the objects you are working with. Maybe there’s a way to extend that idea, where there’s not much manual typing involved at all and it’s mostly tapping on the option you want based on what is relevant in the current scope.

Microsoft had a labs project 5 or 10 years ago attempting to do just this, although it never really got very far before it was canceled. I wish I could remember the name of it now, it was intriguing. Definitely not as productive as coding via a keyboard on a real computer, but it was the best experience you could get on a mobile device, so that’s not nothing.

Maybe the real problem is there’s no way to actually run/use anything you create on mobile. Sure maybe if you’re making a website, but there’s no way to build an app or a helper function that can be used directly on an iPhone or iPad. I assume android has more possibilities here, but I still have yet to see something that will compile code on an android device directly to an APK and install it locally without requiring some sort of server to do the heavy lifting.

It’s interesting to see the communities growing around iOS shortcuts. It’s crazy the amount of hoops people are willing to jump through to create shortcuts that would otherwise be fairly simple scripts in a standard programming language, and then people share them on Reddit communities and elsewhere. If people are willing to bend over backwards for that, just think what a purpose-built system could be used for.

LabView (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LabVIEW) and Simulink (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simulink) are intended for serious work for scientists and engineers.

There are many visual programming environments targetting different domains: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Visual_programming_language#Li...

The biggest issue is that visual programming environments tend to be domain-specific rather than general purpose. A general purpose visual programming environment would be difficult to build and still be as capable as a software developer using one of the mainstream programming languages with IDE.

I don't care how good the interface is, I don't like touch screen typing compared to keyboard typing.

> I have an iPad Pro that’s useless for software development without SSHing into a machine.

And even that is a horrible experience because the iPad keyboard doesn’t allow key repeat, making vim a terrible experience. That used to be an issue anyway. Maybe they’ve fixed it.

And no escape key! How do you get out of VIM insert mode? Control-[? Might as well use Emacs. At least there's an Option key for Meta.

You can rebind some keys on the iPad allowing for the relatively common “rebind Caps Lock to Escape”. That’s how I have mine set up.

What do you mean ‘no escape key’?

All the terminals I have used swap out the suggestions bar for a row of extra keys, with escape in the place you would expect it.

I'm referring to the physical Smart/Magic Keyboard for the iPad from Apple, not the onscreen keyboard:

https://www.apple.com/shop/ipad/ipad-accessories/keyboards

I just learned you can type command-. to send an escape on an iPad keyboard. And also as freehunter mentioned, iPad Settings / General / Keyboard / Hardware Keyboard / Modifier Keys lets you remap caps lock to escape.

https://9to5mac.com/2020/04/23/ipad-pro-magic-keyboard-escap...

> And even that is a horrible experience because the iPad keyboard doesn’t allow key repeat, making vim a terrible experience. That used to be an issue anyway. Maybe they’ve fixed it.

Isn't Vim the editor with the least reliance upon key repeat? Hardcore Vimmers would argue if you are using key repeat, you're doing it wrong.

What do you use key repeat for in Vim?

iOS allows key repeat from external keyboards, but not from the onscreen keyboard. In theory a third-party keyboard should be able to implement that, although I can’t say I’ve seen any examples of it.

Interesting. I have the Apple Smart Keyboard Folio (not the newest magic keyboard) and I've looked everywhere for a way to enable key repeat, to no avail. Am I wrong in thinking that traditionally key repeat is handled at the OS level, rather than the keyboard level? It seems weird to me that each individual keyboard would be in charge of implementing that, especially when the settings for it are part of a desktop OS.

There is a setting within iOS settings > Accessibility > Keyboards > Key Repeat

I’ve never actually used an external keyboard on iOS so I can’t vouch for how well it works, but judging from the settings pane it should do what you want