World: r4wp

Alright now that I'm getting a bit of time on my hands, I hope to 
start digging into Red a bit.  Looking forward to this project.

I was trying to evangelize Red/System to the Raspberry Pi forums 
today, but found it difficult to point them to a "here's how you 
get started" page.  That would be the perfect thing for a "Downloads" 
page on red-lang.org.

Yes, Github is a bit of a problem - it gets some time to orientiate 
oneself ... But otoh, on the main screen of Git, you can download 
latest archive, just see ZIP button - the link is - https://github.com/dockimbel/Red/archive/master.zip

not obvious where that link is ..

There's not so many buttons on Github page ;-) But maybe Doc could 
add above link pointing to latest archive directly to his site, would 
make things for beginners easier. Well, looking at red website I 
now find it also a mistake not having download section ...

I believe redoing the website is on the list of things to do ...

I think that initially, one more section in menu - downloads, would 
do it. Or even simpler - I would rename the Contribution menu item 
to Downloads, and there I would put link to latest github archive, 
plus section below named Contribution ...

here's how you get started

 page" is Github Red page. There you have links for downloading an 
 archive or cloning the repo and all step-by-step instructions to 
 get you started.

Red is certainly not ready for prime time now. What we need now is 
testers and contributors. So just putting a link to source archive 
in a Download section wouldn't help much, as users would have no 
clue what to do with it. Again, there's a "Fork me on Github" button 
on top of all pages on red-lang.org. If users have no clue what Github 
is, then they are probably not ready for contributing. I will add 
a Download section once we have binaries for Red compiler (encapped 
versions of R2 compiler for now).


Once Red gets ready (documented and in beta state), I will open a 
new site that will be fully user-oriented (in contrary to the current 
one which is followers/contributors oriented).


About Red/System: it is meant to be a dialect embedded in Red, however, 
its intrinsic value seems to be high and will be higher as we add 
more feature and optimize it. Maybe it could be a good selling point 
for making some low-level programmers come to Red.  As Red/System 
is much more mature than Red, maybe I should think about opening 
soon a dedicated web site for it (would still need a binary version 
of the compiler)... What do you think?

I think there is value in Red/System outside of Red. Think of the 
primary examples people might use it for, where C might be the first 
choice, and provide examples of what they look like in Red/System. 
I know CGIs are mostly done in high level langs now, but I would 
certainly include one as an example. Implement some performance intensive 
algorithms to show what RedS looks like, compare to C. Or apps that 
need to be small and fast. e.g. a 0MQ broker.

Doc - I was quite surprised with your argumentation. I really don't 
know, if we are so much in an IT, but are you guys serious, that 
for normal user, in order to just give some tool a try, such user 
should use systems like Fossil or Git? I find myself competent enough, 
but unless new Windows client appeared, it was just nightmare to 
get things going, especially if one does not feel the need to understand 
all that pull/push etc. stuff.

If users have no clue what Github is, then they are probably not 
ready for contributing.

 - Doc, that is so much off ... It is not imo about users contributing. 
 It is about various possible future Red users, who just found out 
 about Red, and want to have their first touch with the language, 
 no matter how complete the language is imo. Ppl's will to give it 
 a try should not be prevented by crappy overcomplicated things like 
 Git imo.

Is that really so much of a problem, to add link to latest zip archive, 
with just one sentence, that it points to kind of "nighty" pre alfa 
builds? Or do you really find R/S and Red not being worth giving 
a try even in an early phase of development?

As for creating R/S specific site - I am not sure, how much time 
it would take to create, but unless we are able to adress devices 
like Arduino, Android devices, BeagleBoard(Bone), RaspberryPi, I 
would postpone such a solution imo ....

Git was not designed for humans, AFAICT. It was designed to let loose, 
informal teams manage huge open source projects. Now it has become 
the default hammer, and every software project a nail. I don't mean 
git is bad in any way, and it is successful for a reason. It has 
become friendly enough that a lot of people can use it, but I still 
see notes about how most people don't know how to use it effectively. 


I imagine you could build a great, human-friendly wrapper over git, 
providing 90% of the power with 10% of the effort. It would take 
a git expert and a good designer, but maybe not too much time.

My hope is that people who want a specific platform, and have experience 
on it, would port it because that's what they need. Otherwise we're 
going to overload Doc. :-)

Gregg - the ONLY thing which is really needed, is to add Download 
section to the Red website, pointing to the ZIP button of the Github 
website. That's for those who are not familiar with Git, or to whom 
the Git creates a headache to use. So - is adding one URL to a website 
so much of a challenge?

Pekr: Agreed...that was my initial suggestion.  My further suggestion 
is to have instructions right after those links stating how to get 
started with Red/System and also Red.  A simple step-by-step for 
beginners.

Bo - some simple step-by step is in ititial distro Doc. Might be 
copied on such a page ... at least hello world could be done that 
way :-)

See here - https://github.com/dockimbel/Red/blob/master/README.md
.... good enough for a starter, imo ...

True, but it takes too much searching to find.  red-lang.org is the 
place I would expect to go to download the language, and it would 
be super nice if the instructions were right there as well.  If that 
doesn't work, the second best would be a link to the instructions.

that for normal user, in order to just give some tool a try, such 
user should use systems like Fossil or Git?


That's precisely my point, it's not ready yet for "normal users". 
That's what I mean with not ready for prime time.


I really don't  want to have to maintain two copies of the same instruction 
page on both red-lang.org and github site, just because of people 
passing by and not curious enough to click on the very visible "Fork 
me on github" red banner.

I think I will add a big "Language Under Construction" yellow banner 
on top the red-lang.org site, like in the web 1.0 era. ;-)

Pekr: the right link for the step-by-step instruction is https://github.com/dockimbel/Red/


That's Red home page on Github, the README.md is automatically rendered 
on that page....one-click away from the  main site.

Doc - you still don't seem to understand. Are you so deep in an a 
language design, so that you can't understand lamers like myself? 
:-)

I think, that there is many potential supporters out there, who would 
welcome - You can download very experimental version of Red and Red/System 
to test here ....

But it's your project, do as you consider it being important or not 
:-) I found my way thru, to mess with Github, others might wait ...

Pekr: trust me I know what I'm doing. But as it will take me less 
time to add that Download button than keeping arguing with you about 
that, I will add it. :-)

Changes done on red-lang.org. Download page added.

thanks

Doc, what are you looking for currently in RED movement? - testers... 
developers, debuggers, etc?

I obviously, work as a Windows debugger using most of the core Windows 
Debugging tools and Systems Internals so I could contribute along 
those lines until I get knowledge of RED.

I could have used you in the past week, but I just fixed cURL networking 
on Windows, after setting up a Windows installation for the first 
time in almost a decade

:-)

We still have a problem playing sound with SDL on Windows, so if 
you could do something there, that would be great

Well good thing is that I have access to good size lab at work.

Can you reproduce the problem?

Yes, it produces an error on XP, but on 7, you see it play in the 
mixer without producing any sound

Even odder is that it just works on WINE

If I can reproduce it then we should have no problem fixing it.

What is SDL?

The error on XP seems to be related to DirectSound. Perhaps it needs 
a newer DirectX or a driver, but I'd think SDL would drop down to 
a more primitive sound system

http://www.libsdl.org

The test binaries are here:

http://red.esperconsultancy.nl/Red-test/dir?ci=tip

It's best to use the MSDOS folder. The Windows folder is less complete 
and compiled as GUI apps, so no command line output

The SDL audio program is MSDOS\RedSystem\play-SDL-wav.exe. There's 
a test file sample.wav

Ok, lot of stuff there. So let me explain how I typically operate 
to make this the easiest way for me to help.  I need ONLY the relevant 
files to install, complete with same instrucitons for installation 
that produced the error.  I need to know specific versions as well. 
 Once I know I can re-create the problem, then I need sources (at 
least any programming sources you have) and any symbol files you 
may have or can generate (pdb) files preferred.

If you wait half an hour, I'll have new binaries

No problem Kaj.