Cocoa-Like JavaScript Framework Announced

TwilightSentry writes "Ars Technica reports that a group of developers has created an Objective-C-like extension to JavaScript along with a class library mirroring Cocoa. They've used these to release an impressive demo app called 280 Slides. The article notes, 'Whereas SproutCore seeks to "embrace the platform" by giving a Cocoa-like development model for developers already using HTML, CSS, and JavaScript to make a web app, Cappuccino and Objective-J take an entirely different approach. "Since Cappuccino runs entirely on the client, at run time, we're never actually generating HTML or CSS," says Boucher. "When you build an application in Cappuccino, you don't need to ever deal with HTML or CSS. All of your interface is designed in Objective-J and Cappuccino. Cappuccino focuses on application architecture more than anything else, like building applications that know how to save and open documents, or copy and paste. We also built a powerful graphics engine into Cappuccino, so you can make rich applications like 280 Slides."' The developers plan to release the framework and preprocessor as open source. No mention is made of a specific license."

Podcast interview with the developers

A couple of weeks ago one of the developers of 280 slides was interviewed by Leo Laporte and Amber MacArthur on their net@night podcast [twit.tv].

Caffeine Theme

To extend the meme, now I'll start development of C-Objective Kernel Editor (COKE). that will be followed by Linux Apache Tkl/Tcl Extensions (LATTE) which, of course, demands Folding On AMD Machines (FOAM). Sorry, but I'm too tired to come up with an acronym for marshmallows. ~

Mocha Theme

You are missing the acronym that best describes a combination of Cocoa and Java(Script):

CAFE MOCHA - Cocoa-Alike Framework Extension Mirroring Objective C for HTML Applications

Re:Caffeine Theme

In this case, I'll assume you meant "Found The Words." Thanks.

Re:

I believe the Laverne and Shirley [wikipedia.org] combination of Pepsi and milk would be as close as I've seen.

You'll never know until you try one. Good luck ordering one at Starbucks, Caribou, etc.

Damn ...

Slashdotted already. Don't you people have better things to do?

Re:Damn ...

Don't you people have better things to do?

*holds up mirror*

Taking bets

Who wants to bet how long it will be before Google buys up the guys who made that presentation app?

It could certainly be a bit faster, but it's still damn impressive.

Frighteningly good demo

This is a seriously good piece of software.
If they can do the same for Word and Excel then MS is going to be out of business.

I've Got It!

Since it's Cocoa-like, we have to rename it Carob [living-foods.com]. Quick, somebody get their acronym generator going!

Too slow! Already taken. [continuent.org]

Wow!! Just damned Wow!!

Just WOW!!

As someone who is just learning Cocoa, and finding it though since it's my first real programming language, I am amazed at what 3 guys in a college dorm have cooked up.
Apple need to drop that spruotCore thing like a rock and make happy with these guys. I read that they worked for Apple before spinning this out...
Perhaps if they get offered much better paid positions with Apple they might come back. This is some seriously cool shit they're doing. That web-app required no knowledge at all of HTML & CSS!!
You could even probably write code for OS X and "port" it to the web in minutes!! If Apple get in on this, they could seriously bring about a shift from Flash and horrible media plugins like that silverlight crap, to something everyone can use, even iPhones and Blackberry's.
Words fail to describe how awesome that demo app is.
I was dreading getting to the point of having to learn me some java so I can do web-apps eventually. They've actually managed to make me interested!! Programming is hard and I'm finding it tough, but now I really want to master Cocoa and start on Objective-J and Cappuccino.
WAY TO GO!!!!!

Re:Feh

That's probably true, but sometimes optimizing for programmers' convenience is more important than reducing every ounce of bloat to the bare minimum. RAM is cheap enough and reusable; programmers' time isn't either.

If you're not trying to write a high-performance scalable computing cluster app, or an operating system, or a fancy computer game, then bloat really isn't an issue.

Re:Feh

" If you're not trying to write a high-performance scalable computing cluster app, or an operating system, or a fancy computer game, then bloat really isn't an issue."

Spend 20(+) years fixing other peoples code then get back to me on that one.

Re:Feh

Did you even try the demo? On my dual-core Opteron with 4 gigs of RAM it was *painfully* slow. I can run Windows in Qemu, then run Office inside of that, and it would seem really fast compared to their demo. A little bloat here and there isn't an issue. When an app is so bloated and slow that it's unusable for anything practical, it's a real problem.

If I wanted to feel like I was building a presentation on an ancient 286, I would just dig one out of my closet

Also, until you're volunteering to buy the RAM for me, you can kindly shut the fuck up about how cheap it is. Thanks.

Re:Feh

Which browser were you using?

What browser I'm using shouldn't be relevant.

Well, it does. The "300% increase in javascript speed" browsers like to advertise with new versions actually means something. It's akin to a site using SVG or CSS3--except it does work with every browser, it's just slow.

Re:Feh

I agree with you: Javascript is not technically the best solution to write such an application (for now, let's see when JS2 comes out and will be implemented by all major browsers).
It would be much better written with a non-HTML GUI toolkit, but porting all kind of applications to the Web has some advantages that locally executed apps don't have. Thus we have to see if the benefits outweight the downcomes, and for some the "bloat" is acceptable if the application is online, does not need to be installed and so on.
One of the other, not so obvious benefits (imho) of having all kinds of apps online in javascript is that those applications usually are cross-platform, pushing the OS every day a bit more in the background, and forcing windows on less and less people (if you remember the Netscape days, that was exactly the reason Microsoft tried (and succeeded) to crush them - or at least that was what the press was saying at the time). I think most people that run windows still have to run it because of some arcane app that only runs on that platform, and locking that user right in. If this becomes a trend, more and more applications will become cross-platform and less and less users will be forced to use one specific platform. And if that day comes, maybe javascript v3 will become better suited for rich GUI Apps.

Re:Feh

>>I agree with you: Javascript is not technically the best solution to write such an application

And how exactly does JavaScript fall short?

A lot of programmers look down on it because of its poor start but in its current state its a perfectly capable programming language, even without superfluous v2 features. The biggest problem with web apps is supporting IE 6.

Re:Feh

I agree with you: Javascript is not technically the best solution to write such an application (for now, let's see when JS2 comes out and will be implemented by all major browsers).

Why?

Because JavaScript doesn't (yet) support classes?

If that is the answer, then with all due respect I thoroughly disagree. JavaScript is an OO language, it just uses differential (or prototype-based) inheritance, rather than class-based inheritance. It's quite possible to write fully featured GUI apps using a language that adopts a differential inheritance model. I did that for many years on the Newton, using NewtonScript.

The Newton OS APIs (object prototypes) that went with NewtonScript worked just fine, and provided a GUI that was in a number of ways more advanced than Cocoa. Gave very decent performance on an extremely limited platform.

Personally I have yet to be convinced of the wisdom of including classes in JavaScript2 - it feels unnecessary to me.

Re:Feh

Because everyone spends all their time flying 35000 feet above the Atlantic ;)

Quick, beam me up. I want to live in your floating habitats too.

Re:Feh

There may be some initial delays when you open up new UI elements (since we delay loading to improve initial performance). Our images are taking longer than usual to load. If you use the app for more than a few minutes (i.e. after you've initially loaded most of the UI), does the issue persist? It shouldn't. The best explanation I could offer is that Firefox 2 on Linux does have some performance issues of its own. FF3 would probably help a lot. That being said, I use it on my macbook pro with FF2 all the time without issue.

Re:SproutCore - it relies on ruby

Well, the nice thing about Objective-J is that it's a strict superset of JavaScript. At any time you can simply write pure JavaScript and it will run just fine. You don't even technically need to use Objective-J to use Cappuccino (our framework), but it makes it MUCH easier. As far as using Ruby or anything else, everything we do in the application is pure client side. The only interaction with the server is via XMLHTTPRequests. We'll be able to distribute Cappuccino/Objective-J as a simple download.

Re:Impressive, but broken

Unfortunately browsers don't provide much (or really any) information about many non-english input methods. On the plus side, copy/paste does work with any unicode character (if it's any consolation). This is definitely a problem, and a shortfall of one of our earlier design decisions. We're working on revamping our text system to resolve this, and other issues.

Re:Impressive, but broken

Why would the browser need to tell you about a non-English input method? In my experience of I18N of web apps, this is completely unnecessary, since the input method is invisible to the application (rather like switching keyboard layouts) - all that's needed is for the web app to support Unicode etc. Since JavaScript uses Unicode natively, I can't quite see how 280 North has managed to break Unicode support like this.

Re:Reinventing XUL... BADLY

Where exactly does it "Breaks in places in Firefox?" Let us know and we'll get right on it.

Re:Impressions

A lot of mediocre programmers seem to complain about Objective-C syntax and Cocoa and whatnot. I can tell you, after 14 years immersed in C++, Cocoa/Objective-C was a breath of fresh air. I picked up the language in about a day and the basics of Cocoa in a few more. Obviously getting really comfortable with it takes a while longer but after doing Cocoa solidly now for 5 years I'd find it very hard to give up. If you've yet to see the advantage then you're probably not doing anything seriously with it. The dynamic dispatch alone simplifies things in a way that C++ can only dream of.

As for MFC, it's a total joke compared to what you can accomplish in Cocoa with a fraction of the code and with a result in another league in terms of stability and quality.

I'm not a rabid fanboi or whatever I'll probably get accused of, but after using a number of languages and frameworks over the years (including developing my own general purpose framework in C++ for Mac) I can tell you that in my experience Cocoa is the best there is right now, and that has been the case for a while.