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VisualJS
Visual Basic reimagined for the internet age
Docs (in progress)
https://yazz.com/visifile/docs/book/main.html
PDF of last physical magazine (March 2020)
https://yazz.com/visifile/docs/yazz_march_2020.pdf
What is VisualJS?
VisualJS is a browser based tool to build internal web applications using reusable components. It works with PC/Mac/Linux (desktop application or NodeJS) or as a container (Docker, Kubernetes). To develop an app:
- Start the VisualJS web server
- Create an app in your web browser
- Share the app with others by sending them the app URL
VisualJS is perfect for prototyping apps. Some demo apps can be found at https://yazz.com
Benefits
- Easy to use: Easy to use drag and drop visual interface (like Visual Basic)
- Supports multiple web wallets: Currently supports Metamask
- Standard scripting language: Uses Javascript
- Permissive license: Open source MIT license so you can do whatever you want with it
- Easy to distribute apps: Apps can be exported to a single HTML file and sent by email (even SQLite database apps)
- Works almost anywhere: Windows, Linux, Mac, Raspberry PI, NodeJS, Docker, Kubernetes, OpenShift, Istio
- Works offline: Editor works both locally and offline
- Reuse existing databases: Can read MS Access databases (even Linux or Mac can read MS Access files)
Features
- Build local or online dApps as a series of forms
- Add components to a form, such as buttons, images, input fields
- Add interactivity using Javascript
- Connect to databases such as Postgres, Mysql
- Connect to REST APIs
- Connect the outputs of one component to the inputs of another
- Build Microservices
- Each app has a built in SQLite database
- App source code saved as a single .vjs file
What it can't do
- Build slick UIs for public facing websites
- Build mobile apps
- Build self contained executables (need to pass in a .vjs file)
- High performance apps
- Low level systems
Quick Install Guide
NodeJS on Mac
Assuming that you have NodeJS, NPM, and Git installed, enter the following commands at the command line:
> git clone https://github.com/yazz/visualjavascript.git > cd VisualJS > npm install > xcode-select --install > npm uninstall sqlite3 > npm install sqlite3 --build-from-source --target_arch=arm64 --fallback-to-build > npm start
Browse to http://0.0.0.0:80 to open VisualJS
NodeJS
Assuming that you have NodeJS, NPM, and Git installed, enter the following commands at the command line:
> git clone https://github.com/yazz/visualjavascript.git > cd VisualJS > npm install > npm start
Browse to http://0.0.0.0:80 to open VisualJS
Docker
Make sure that you have Docker installed. Then:
> docker run -p 80:80 yazzcom/yazz:march2022
Browse to http://0.0.0.0:80 to open VisualJS
Useful links:
- Demo which works on desktop web browsers here: https://yazz.com/app/appstore.html
- Link to PDF docs: https://yazz.com/visifile/docs/yazz_march_2020.pdf
- Link to Hacker News Post (when it was known as Yazz Pilot): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21734845
- Link to Kubernetes Operator (Previous name was AppShare) https://github.com/leskil/appshare-operator
Command line options:
--cacert1 Public HTTPS CA certificate 1
--cacert2 Public HTTPS CA certificate 2
--cacert3 Public HTTPS CA certificate 3
--debug Allow to run NodeJS in debug mode (default false)
--deleteonexit Delete database files on exit (default false)
--deleteonstartup Delete database files on startup (default false)
--help Output usage information
--hostport Server port of the central host (default 80)
--host Server address of the central host (default yazz.com)
--https Run using a HTTPS (default is false)
--jaegercollector Jaeger Open tracing collector endpoint (default not set) eg: http://localhost:14268/api/traces
--loadjscode Load the following JS from the command line (default not set)
--loadjsfile Load the following JS from a file (default not set)
--loadjsurl Load the following JS from a URL (default not set)
--locked Allow server to be locked/unlocked on start up (default true)
--maxJobProcessDurationMs Maximum time to wait for a job to complete (default 10000 ms)
--maxprocessesretry Number of processes to retry when all cores are busy (default 10 processes)
--port Which port should I listen on? Default 80 or 3000 (if not run as sudo)
--private Private HTTPS key location
--public Public HTTPS certificate location
--runapp Run the app with ID as the appstore (default not set)
--runhtml Run using a local HTML page as the appstore (default not set)
--showdebug Allow to show debug info (default false)
--statsinterval Allow to show debug info every x seconds (default 10 seconds)
--showprogress Show progress when starting VisualJS (default false)
--showstats Allow to show stats debug info (default false)
--usehost Use host name [usehost]
--useselfsignedhttps Use self signed HTTPS for local development (default false)
--version output the version number
--virtualprocessors How many virtual processors to run (default 6 processors)
Roadmap
- 2013 Started developement in Clojure/Clojurescript
- 2014 Named Clojure on Coils
- 2015 Development slows, as focus moved to Light Table / Eve project
- 2016 Clojure development stopped as Eve making good progress.
- 2016 Started Development of Visifile in Javascript, an search engine for internal enterprise data
- 2018 Eve project shuts down
- 2018 Visifile launches but finds out the problem is too difficult to solve. Pivots the product to a low code tool (also because Eve has been shut down)
- 2019 Visifile code removed from codebase
- 2021 Enterprise App Store for ISVs to discover, create, buy, and sell VisualJS components and apps to enterprises
- 2021 Support for Istio, Rancher, KNative, OpenWhisk, OpenFaas, AWS
- 2021 Enterprise connectivity via Red Hat, IBM, Salesforce, SAP, Oracle, Stripe, and other enterprise components
- 2021 Desktop version in Mac app store
- 2021 Paid for hosting options
- 2022 An editor to make programs in VR/AR editor
- 2025 Machine Learning and vision components
- 2027 Miniature thumbnail size version
- 2030 Dust sized version
- 2032 Dust sized version with internal camera for medical diagnoses applications
FAQ
FAQ - High Level Questions
What is VisualJS?
VisualJS is a tool to build internal web applications. Applications are built using pre-built graphical and server side components, with glue code written in Javascript. VisualJS can run on Windows, OsX (via the Mac App store), and Kubernetes and Docker containers. Ideally VisualJS is used for small throwaway or demo apps, but can also be used for more complex apps since it also contains an embedded SQLite database.
What is VisualJS's killer feature?
VisualJS's killer feature is the ability to create simple webapps extremely fast, on almost any platform, with no licensing or troublesome installation procedures. The application can then be distributed as a single HTML file WITHOUT even needing the original VisualJS runtime.
Who should use VisualJS today?
An ideal user for VisualJS is someone who wants to build small web apps for internal use (such as demos), or someone who wants to do small data processing tasks. So far there have been independant people and large enterprises have used VisualJS for building demos and for small data processing tasks.
What does VisualJS mean by Self Service?
When we say Self Service we mean that VisualJS can be used by people who are not professional programmers. This is possible because VisualJS has a drag and drop user interface which makes it easy for "non techies" to design and build applications. Also, many components included in VisualJS have a custom design time graphical editor which make it easy to configure them.
How much will VisualJS cost?
VisualJS is free to download and use. It uses the MIT license so you are free to copy and distribute VisualJS applications that you build. VisualJS, the company behind VisualJS may release a paid hosted version at some point which will most likely be a web based service (like hosted Wordpress).
Is VisualJS Production ready?
Yes, VisualJS is production ready and has been used in many enterprise environments.
Is there commercial support for VisualJS?
If you require commercial support then please go to https://yazz.com. If you want a consulting assignment with VisualJS our email is contact@yazz.com
I'm worried about vendor lock-in. What happens if Yazz goes out of business?
VisualJS is Open Source so you can download the opensource repo or fork the Github repo. VisualJS is also based on VueJS, HTML, and Javascript so you can slowly migrate applications off VisualJS to similar technologies in the Javascript ecosystem if needed.
What is VisualJS's long term vision?
VisualJS's long term vision is to make personal automation and embedded medical applications easy to build. An example of a medical device is a tiny device that is injected into the blood stream to detect and destroy dangerous cells (using tiny cameras and Tensorflow). To get to this long term goal we need to take many tiny steps on the way. First we need to succeed with desktop web applications, and to create an app store for internal enterprise apps and components. Next we need to miniturise the system to work in embedded and internal environments, and finally we need support for autonomous systems which use autodiscovery of components which can be loaded on demand. As an example of why autodiscovery is important is for a medical application where an unrecognised cell type in the human body is found by computer vision, VisualJS could go out to the network to see if this cell is recognized somewhere else and download the particular code related to that cell type to detect if it is dangerous or not.
Why did VisualJS switch to Javascript from Clojure/Clojurescript?
For the first 3 years the author, Zubair used Clojure/Clojurescript for the development of VisualJS. But in 2016 Zubair switched from Clojure/Clojurescript as he thought that the product was limiting itself to a very small subset of developers, whereas Javascript has a much larger developer pool.
Is VisualJS compatible with Visual Basic?
No. Since VisualJS uses Javascript as the scripting language instead of Basic there is zero compatibility with Visual Basic.
FAQ - Comparison to other products
What is VisualJS's unique selling point compared to other low code tools?
Think of VisualJS as a Swiss Army Knife tool for building small internal applications. It is a good general purpose tool for quick and dirty tasks such as calculating a few numbers, or visualising an API, but not meant for heavy duty specialist work such as responsive websites, or internet commerce websites. While there are many existing tools in the low code space, most of them are either paid SAAS products, or developer focused open source products, often with complex installation procedures. Unlike many other tools VisualJS is both open source and easy to install.
How does VisualJS compare to Visual Basic?
The author of VisualJS is a huge fan of Visual Basics. VisualJS is trying to recreate the essence of the Visual Basic component ecosystem from the 1990s, but in Javascript.
In Visual Basic the VBA language has been embedded in many other languages, such as Excel, but VisualJS is a bit different. The runtime is meant to be used standalone and connect to other systems such as Excel via components. In fact everything in VisualJS is just a component, including the VisualJS drag and drop editor, which can also be replaced. For example, planned for the future is to offer other development paradigms such as a VR/AR editor using Oculus Quest and WebXR.
How does VisualJS compare to Beads
Beads is a very interesting product which has some things in common with VisualJS such as the debugger, but some other things are totally opposite like Beads has invented their own language and syntax. However, VisualJS definitely takes some inspiration from Beads. Here is a recent thread on Beads on Hacker News to find out more about it: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27287989
How does VisualJS relate to the Unison language
Unison is an exellent language for distributed computing. There is no relation except that both Unison and VisualJS are based on the principal of immutable code where code is addressed by the SHA256 of the source code which means that the VisualJS internally identifies all code as the SHA256 hash of the source code.
How does VisualJS relate to StoryScript language
There is no real relation as StoryScript is a Glue code for multiple languages using AI and plain English language to interact with them, whereas VisualJS is more where the user has be very intentional and choose which components to interact with by to dragging and dropping components onto a form and connecting them together using links and Javascript.
How does VisualJS relate to Eve?
Full disclosure, the creator of VisualJS was the initial angel investor in Eve. Some concepts of universality are taken from Eve. Eve invented a new language to build systems using reactive concepts, but VisualJS uses it's own language and is not as reactive.
How does VisualJS compare to https://www.anytype.io/?
Anytype is more of an internet operating system. As of June 2021 AnyType is still closed source. Anytype does use IPFS for storage which is a technology, along with QRI that VisualJS is considering for data storage.
How does VisualJS compare to Retool?
As of May 2021 Retool is a great paid SAAS offering. We can recommend Retool for anyone who wants a paid SAAS offering with great support.
How does VisualJS compare to Javascript frameworks like VueJS, React , and Angular?
First off, VisualJS, uses VueJS under the hood to build UI components. VisualJS is very different to all those frameworks as VisualJS does not require deep coding skills or knowledge of HTML. You do need to know some Javascript to use VisualJS though.
How does VisualJS compare to Airtable?
It doesn't. Well, Airtable is a database tool which can have apps built on top of as well, whereas VisualJS really is to build apps on top of enterprise APIs and databases. It must be noted that every VisualJS application does have a built in SQLite database as well.
How does VisualJS compare to Anvil?
Anvil uses Python to build apps whereas VisualJS uses Javascript. But Anvil is very good, and supports Javascript now, so try it!
How does VisualJS compare to Mendix?
Mendix is a commercial low code product owned by Siemens, and is a very different thing since it is closed source.
How does VisualJS compare to Outsystems?
Outsystems is a commercial low code product and is a very different thing since it is closed source
How does VisualJS compare to Node Red?
Node Red is a very intuitive system to process events and actions by linking nodes together. It has a different use case than VisualJS as Node Red is mostly used for IoT applications.
How does VisualJS compare to Huginn
Huginn is a very intuitive personal task handler. VisualJS is more for applications that need user interaction.
How does VisualJS compare to IFTTT
IFTTT is a paid web only SAAS task automator. VisualJS is more for applications that need user interaction.
How does VisualJS compare to Zapier
Zapier is a paid web only SAAS task automator. VisualJS is more for applications that need user interaction.
How does VisualJS compare to Autocode
Autocode is great cross platform event handler. It is very text based and aims to link systems together. VisualJS is more for applications that need user interaction.
How does VisualJS compare to Delphi
Delphi was a desktop IDE from the 1990s using Pascal as the programming language, and had a great set of controls and was even VBX (Visual Basic Custom Controls) compatible. Some people use Deplhi today for desktop Windows apps, and it is definitely one of the inspirations for VisualJS. Delphi used Pascal as the language and VisualJS uses Javascript.
How does VisualJS compare to Dynamic Land
Dynamic Land has been a big inspiration for VisualJS in that we think that the model Dynamic Land uses, of spatial computing will be the future, hence the built-in VR in VisualJS. We see a future where the VisualJS editor could be used in a spatial way with VR to build programs.
How does VisualJS compare to Bubble.io?
As of June 2021 Bubble is a paid hosted web app builder and is good for building a public facing website. Bubble is excellenet for build your low code startup's public facing site, so it is a different market space than VisualJS.
How does VisualJS compare to DeFi?
DeFi is more a concept than a single product, but VisualJS takes many inspirations from Blockchain and DeFi projects. We have considered how we could run VisualJS as a series of nodes, much like DFinity and the Internet Computer.
FAQ - Features and compatibility
Does VisualJS use native libraries?
Yes, but only one. A SQlite native module is used. Everything else is pure Javascript. The reason for this is that Sqlite works almost everywhere. For all other components we like to keep everything as pure Javascript. This often means that we limit ourselves to which third party libraries that we can use. When exporting a Viual Javascript application as a HTML file we use SQLite compiled to Webassembly/Javascript so no native modules are needed.
Why doesn't VisualJS let me edit mutliple files as a tree like a traditional IDE?
VisualJS breaks down all problems into single files, each of which contains a single Javascript function, which acts as a component. A component can call other components as well if needed to form larger programs.
Does VisualJS work with VMWare PKS or other versions of Kubernetes?
VisualJS has been tested with Kubernetes, OpenShift, and Docker. We will test with more versions, including Rancher as time goes by, but it should work fine with VMWare PKS, GCP, and other Kubernetes distributions
What does the VisualJS Scheduler do?
The Scheduler is a NodeJS process which decides which worker process to send a server task to. Each process takes about 40MB of RAM and the default number of these "virtual processors" is 6.
How do VisualJS processes communicate with each other?
VisualJS processes communicate using IPC (Inter Process Communication) via NodeJS
What is the basic unit of code in VisualJS?
A component is the basic unit of code in VisualJS, represented as a function in a .vjs text file
Does VisualJS use AI?
No deep AI yet, but AI is planned for machine vision and learning algorithms. Also AI may be used to match component inputs and outputs and for intelligent code completion in the IDE. We do currently use TensorFlow for computer vision but we don't consider this real AI
What happens if a server side component goes bad in VisualJS?
VisualJS runs all server components in their own child NodeJS process, so if a component goes bad then VisualJS will restart kill the NodeJS process, restart a new NodeJS process, and return an error code to the caller
Does VisualJS work offline?
Yes! One of the great things about VisualJS is that it works offline without an internet connection
How does version control work in VisualJS?
VisualJS removes the complexity of separate version control systems like git. Changes to your code are structured using distributed diff algorithms
Every time I restart VisualJS I can't see my apps. How do I save them?
You need to save the apps that you wish to keep by pessing the button "Save as .vjs file" in the editor
I’m already invested in my favorite text editor. Can I keep using it with VisualJS?
VisualJS's basic file format is text, so you can use any editor, but your programs will have to be imported into VisualJS if you wish to use the interactive editor
Is it planned to support other languages than Javascript in VisualJS?
No
Do Visual Basic apps run on VisualJS?
No. VisualJS only run apps written in VisualJS itself as .vjs files
Can I use my VBX/OLE controls in a VisualJS app?
No. VisualJS apps can only use .vjs components
Where can I find the app store for VisualJS?
It is under development at the moment, but the code is here in this Git Repository for components
What is the extension for all VisualJS apps?
The extension is ".vjs" but you can also use the ".js" extension for loading some simple Javascript apps
How can I work with VisualJS offline when developing Ethereum apps?
You can run VisualJS using the Docker Eth node:
docker run -it -p 30303:30303 ethereum/client-go --syncmode "light"
FAQ - Company and team related questions
Who is involved with VisualJS.
Zubair Quraishi is the main developer. There are also other people who also help out from time to time, including people from Google, Microsoft, and other companies.
Is VisualJS looking for investment
No, we don't need money as VisualJS has been sponsoring the development of the VisualJS tool. We would only consider investment from the outside if it was a very long term partnership, as VisualJS is expecting to be unprofitable for many years to come. We have been approached by many investors to invest in us, but we would only consider long term investors who would also bring some strategic value to yazz/VisualJS.
FAQ - Getting involved
I want to write libraries for VisualJS - how can I take part in the VisualJS community/ecosystem?
We will be releasing developer guidelines soon
Is there a community that I can join to find out more? - yes, join our Slack group at
https://visualjavascript.slack.com
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Total Stars
567
Total Forks
49
Public Gists
3
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