We all feel like this … in the morning. Until that first cup of coffee, we feel like we are dragging, and then that first drop of caffeine arrives. In a similar fashion, as developers (as most of us rely on coffee) like ease of use, CodeNeighbor has added the ability to drag code into the editor window and drop it in for use.
We aim to provide these type of features, while in this case, not earth shattering, undeniably is a great thing to provide ease of use – this is the outcome we expect:
One of the primary purposes for creating CodeNeighbor was to enable builders to build faster, with more standardized procedures (best practices) and simplify the traditional boilerplate code that exists is most applications. While this is not new, CodeNeighbor provides the ability to find those chunks of code (snippets) to either add to a template or simply add to your code directly (in XCode).
Template generation, the CodeNeighbor way, enables you with a green field / clean slate approach. You can use existing templates, build your own or a combination of both. You identify the snippets, if any, to include in those templates and then you click a button and sit back while the magic happens.
Traditional sites which enable the non technical individual to build mobile apps is something that was once very popular, but that popularity came at a price. The app stores started rejecting those apps based on various criteria, the apps were generally no more than brochure-ware quality and to be honest, those apps that require the thing that makes them stand out, well, was not possible with those site generators.
We do not approach app building with that philosophy, rather, we enhance the building of apps through these templates and snippet inclusions directly while allowing the mobile developer to focus on that which makes the app a work of art, a thing of beauty and a joy forever.
Today the ability to update your profile has been made available. This improvement allows for the update of details previously unavailable. This accompanies other new sections as well, including the viewing of neighbors, teams, messages and other content all from one location – pretty snazzy !
Well, we have decided that our current platform has out grown us and now, our head is in the clouds. We have decided that now is the time to migrate to the cloud (no, we won’t name names, but … it is not a non-player … i.e. a database driven cloud provider … who shall rename nameless).
By positioning ourselves to be a cloud minder, we realize that this puts us in a position to scale to new neighbors, like yourselves and to continue to grow towards tomorrow … and who doesn’t want to look towards tomorrow?
To say “a small piece snipped off; a small bit, scrap, or fragment” is selling snippets short. All developers since the beginning of time (well, after the first line of code was created) have copied from existing code, creating a snippet. Why do we do this?
The rule of thumb is – ‘be lazy’. That’s the truth … developers are inherently lazy. To be fair, it is not truly laziness, but the desire to reduce the mundane, low brow, pain staking effort of typing the same thing over and over until our fingers go numb. So, we copy and paste – and that is more efficient, quicker and ideologically, gets to the finish line faster.
But … be sure of what you are copying, as an error in a snippet, pasted, will increase technical debt, cost and in the end … WE WILL HAVE TO TYPE THINGS IN ANYWAY – therefore, just be careful of what snippets you craft !
As of today, we have fully automated the discovery, retrieval and analysis of repositories for the purpose of analysis and identification of assets for CodeNeighbor. This has allowed us to focus on providing more features to you and ensure that content is obtained on a timely basis, is processed quickly and available for consumption as soon as new repositories are located.
A user centric dashboard user interface has been added to CodeNeighbor which provides details on artifacts, latest repositories and other related information. This dashboard will serve as the starting point for the journey into discovering assets, collaborating and building your projects.
Depending on your subscription level, additional capabilities will be present such as chat, visual search, template generation, service creation (and testing), modeling … well, needless to say, we have a lot features we are actively working on.
One major purpose for this system is to locate (and re-use) artifacts from existing iOS projects. The heavy lift that is required to do this is the analysis of an XCode project and identification of the component parts of a project.
Identification, classification and storing of this information has begun. As this repository of assets grows, the value of those assets are revealed through search, capture and re-use through your own project efforts. Eventually, if those artifacts are ‘watched’ for change, updates to these parent projects can be communicated through the channel of your choosing, to absorb these changes if requested.
Our intent is to build a vast collection of valuable assets, that provide quality, function and have targeted purpose to enable the construction of mobile apps through template generation, annotated inclusion and copying the efforts of those talented authors of these repositories.
As they say, the sincerest imitation is the sincerest form of flattery (for software development, it’s forking someone else’s repository) !
We are excited to start this journey of discovery, collaboration, acceleration of construction and sharing of artifacts, widgets and solutions today. We have some lofty goals to achieve these outcomes and are changing our approach to the ‘way of working’.
While CodeNeighbor is a privately held solution, our belief is through community involvement, together we can build something everyone has a voice in, which will benefit the entire neighborhood! Similar to open sourcing this solution, there will be opportunities for suggestions, contribution (which yields benefits) and market sharing of solutions (to be defined later).
Welcome to CodeNeighbor where we believe that no person is an island and where neighborhoods build teams (formal and informal) that will help us all be successful in the development of mobile applications !
