Remove Clay and Noj

[kloimhardt]

I think it can cause some harm for SciCloj if we have two different noj.jars around.
I think if we remove Clay and Noj all is good.
The beginner experience would not suffer too much, just a second .jar download.
And we still we'd have something to offer for those who do not yet want to install VSCode.

[kloimhardt]

The idea is to start two Java processes, first (A) Noj with Clay and then (B) fegloj as currently implemented, except Clay is not started in this second fegloj process (B).

The command to start (A) Noj is

java -cp noj-2-beta19.1-uber.jar:./. clojure.main -e "(do (require '[scicloj.clay.v2.api :as clay]) (clay/make! {:live-reload true :base-source-path \"notebooks\" :base-target-path \"temp\"}))"

It would be great to create the next release of noj-*-uber.jar in such a way that on double-click (i.e. on open) the command of step (A) is executed. Especially add ./. to the classpath (this enables notebooks to require other namespaces).

Another idea is to make noj-*-uber.jar show, on double-click (i.e. on open), a message that describes how to quit the process. This is because it seems that currently the noj-*-uber.jar can be started only once via double-click, it seems impossible to be stopped and restarted. At least, when I accidentally closed the Clay browser tab, I could not get it to reappear again with a new double-click on noj-*-uber.jar.

I think the approach to include Clay in the current fegloj repository and .jar is the wrong approach. There should be only one single place where one or more .jar files containing Clay+Noj is/are released. This is because a beginner in Clojure can well be a senior scientist. As such he deserves the hottest and latest release of noj from the official maintainers. He has no time for dealing with unofficial second hand stuff (which Clay+Noj within the current fegloj.jar, like it or not, will be seen as).

This also means: for SciCloj to provide a beginner experience, the official noj-*-uber.jar must be able to display a minimal message to the user as he double clicks on it. Is that possible without a GUI-window opening, saying "hello, here is the "Quit" button"? There is some opposition to add GUI windows to Noj.jar. Maybe there is a solution to display a message without a GUI-window.

[kloimhardt]

Another approach:

Maybe it's best for this repository to provide two .jar files

A) The first .jar is called noj-on-wheels-2-beta19.1-uber.jar. It is basically noj-2-beta19.1-uber.jar(same functionality, especially Clay live-reload), but has the above two mentioned features that 1) on double-click a GUI-window "Quit" opens and 2) the current local directory is automatically added to the classpath. If a new release of the official noj-*-uber.jarappears, there is no need to provide a new noj-on-wheels, as the official noj-*-uber.jar can serve as a drop in for noj-on-wheels, the noj-*-uber.jar just needs to be started (not via double-click but) on the command prompt with the command for (A) shown above java -cp noj-...:live-reload true .... Upon a new official noj release, a new noj-on-wheels can be provided or not, in any case the release number and functionality of noj-on-wheels must always match some official noj-*-uber.jar. Again, the release of noj-on-wheels does not need to be up to date, it just must not diverge in versioning and functionality.
While noj-on-wheels is meant to be opened via double-click, a REPL-console should be started. Although this REPL-console will not be visible when starting via double-click, there is no reason why a user wouldn't want to start noj-on-wheels from the command-line and use the REPL-prompt "like a caveman" via copy paste from his editor.

B) the second .jar is called clooj-basic.jar, it is like the current fegloj.jarbut without Clay included. The result is a .jar for a clooj-editor-derivative that is not meant to have code-completion or REPL features. (See issue #3 on long term ideas on that issue "more editor features").

The upshot is that the user downloads the two .jars (A) and (B) into the same local directory and double-clicks on both of them in any order. If the user needs to work with the hottest and latest release of noj (which will eventually be the case), he starts the official noj release from the command line and only double-clicks on clooj-basic.jar. After a while, he will switch from clooj to VSCode/Calva and this repository has served its purpose for that user.

[timothypratley]

Just some thoughts:

Removing Clay and Noj really just leaves kloimhardt/clooj, so there isn't really a need for fegloj so long as kloimhardt/clooj does what you want... I guess that's the challenge, coming up with a good name and definition for "it".

Very interesting idea to add the current path to the classpath. Extending on this idea it might be possible to automatically download "Noj standalone" (or other desirable jars) 🤔 when they are missing and desired. Extending on that we might wish to delegate dependency management even further... 🤔

One thing I'm not sure about is whether it wouldn't be better to give someone a deps.edn file. Or create a project template (similar idea), (neil command line seems very promising also). On the one hand that's the whole point, we are excited about having a standalone executable jar that doesn't require installation or any extra understanding. On the other hand, maybe requiring Clojure to be installed can still be relatively easy with sufficient templates.

[kloimhardt]

Best is what is best for SciCloj. Most important is that the community agrees on one single SciCloj senior-scientist-clojure-beginner setup. If that senior-scientist-clojure-beginner setup is agreed to be a project template, that is certainly a good solution.

My dream is that every SciCloj video/talk begins with a clean slate Java, download noj-on-wheels and clooj-basic jars, double click on both and directly hack on the plot in Downloads/notebooks/my_notebook.clj. But maybe, yes, every talk can start with installing Clojure. My only hard requirement for a senior-scientist-clojure-beginner setup is that it is also shown on an MS-Windows(TM) machine. Platform independence is the advantage of .jar files.

But, @timothypratley if you think that a template is best, who am I to claim knowledge of the best setup?

I thought about "automatically download desirable jars" as well. Conclusion: not good. This is the kind of insemination senior-scientists hate. We need to keep the promise "No more cluttering of your MS-Windows(TM) laptop. You download, you are in charge". My expectation of a senior-scientist-clojure-beginner setup is that it is in most cases abandoned in favour of already installed Matlab. But there is this 1% who are intrigued.

There actually IS need for Fegloj, this is because of issue #3. There will be editor alternatives, my clooj-student will go eventually, Fegloj stays. We need Fegloj for things like adding the current classpath to noj-on-wheels or to show a GUI-window with two buttons named clay/browse! and quit (clay/browse! needed when the browser tab was closed for some reason - Prof. Spector was pointing to that problem, see below). Who knows what is needed next?

But, @timothypratley , if you like the template idea more, really, who am I to say? I could be totally wrong with all this. My arguments, except the MS-Windows(TM) requirement, are not backed by experience reports.

Instead, what we should all keep under our pillows is what Prof. Spector says, this is why I added #6 with his quotes.

And indeed, at the moment, Prof. Spector seems to like Clay+Repl. So the best way forward would be to leave Fegloj the way it is and ask for his feedback on the Fegloj video you made. The reason I started hacking on Clooj is his quote "noj.jar is a thing of beauty, but it needs to be paired with the right editor and I'm not sure what that would be". Let his opinion be be the whetstone of our sword (hope to have gotten Shakespeare right on this one :-)

[timothypratley]

No, I don't like templates 😆
I'm quite confused though because we discussed many variations and possibilities.
Could you summarize how you imagine the ideal scenario?

[kloimhardt]

@timothypratley , we currently already have the ideal scenario with fegloj-0.1.0-SNAPSHOT-standalone.jar, only that

• fegloj.jar needs to be split into two parts, the FEGuiL part (noj-on-wheels) and the editor part (clooj-basic).
• the version/name of the first part needs to be noj-on-wheels-2-beta19.1-uber.jar, i.e. the same version/name as its feature-parity sibling, the one official noj.jar.

(update 11.2.26: Carsten is now proposing two official noj.jars, his noj-2-beta19.1-clay.jar very much leads into the direction of my noj-on-wheels-2-beta19.1-uber.jar)

Describing this split of of fegloj.jar in more detail:

1. There is the single one official noj-*-uber.jar, which continues to be upgraded to newer versions, completely independent of noj-on-wheels

2. There is, released in this repository, noj-on-wheels-2-beta19.1-uber.jar, which has feature-parity with the specific noj-2-beta19.1-uber.jar, but has added features

• on double-click start the FEGuiL, i.e. Clay in file watch mode
• on double-click show a GUI window with the button "Quit" used to stop the FEGuiL
• has the current directory ./. added to its classpath.

3. noj-on-wheels can in principle stay in version beta19.1 forever, no need to upgrade in tandem with official noj.jar. This is because not only noj-on-wheels but also the official noj.jar can (clumsily but can) be used with

4. the second part, the editor part, named clooj-basic.jar. It is released in this repository, right together with noj-on-wheels but has no version in its name. On double-click, clooj-basic opens the editor (no Clay, no classpath, no FEGuil, just the editor).

[timothypratley]

Thanks! Makes sense to me

[kloimhardt]

While the topic of this issue is "remove Clay and Noj", another possibility is to remove (practically all of) Noj whilst keeping Clay and clooj in one single double-clickable fegloj uberjar. So no splitting in two .jar files in this case.

@timothypratley at least this is how I understood your Zulip comment

I do intend to continue exploring a "download and double click" experience, but I don't think it needs to be central to Noj