Hi,
I installed Monkey yesterday. I think it has a long way to go.. and programming plugins in java might be easier.
It appears to me that there is
1. No color coding in the editor (for .em files)
2. No debugger
3. No autocomplete... author has to *know* the API's
4. No documentation integration
So, it doesn't seem interactive at all- the only feedback loop is running a script, but you have to do lowest-common-denominator alert/println to debug. That's less a conversation with the environment than it is long-distance correspondence :) One quick way to get a lot of interactivity would be to wire up the shell that comes with Rhino -
http://www.mozilla.org/rhino/shell.html It looks like just the thing:
$ java org.mozilla._javascript_.tools.shell.Main
js> print('hi')
hi
js> 6*7
42
js> function f() {
return a;
}
js> var a = 34;
js> f()
34
Why not use .JS for monkey files? That way, normal _javascript_ editors could help..at least color code, maybe be hooked up with the object model/DOM for autocomplete. (Monkey scripts would be those with /* Menu: in their comments )
At the current stage, I could see Monkey being great for an Eclipse developer who knows the API's cold... but as a learning tool to ease into the environment it's missing many essentials/Inspectors to understand the objects you're dealing with.
I would actually love it if I could write a Java class which would automagically be loaded into menus.. so I could step into it with the debugger. As a java developer, my sense of the Eclipse elephant is primarily a java tool... I need to learn all the plugin puzzle pieces, and think I'd do better in the java world
Jeff
