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Code Bubbles: Rethinking the User Interface Paradigm of Integrated Development Environments

AndrewBragdon · 283.5K views · 2010-03-09 · 8:19

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Overview

A short demo of Code Bubbles, an IDE interface built around editable code fragments in bubbles instead of files. It was a research prototype for Java development.

On Hacker News

HN keeps returning to it as the most convincing example of moving past file-based code editing, even though it never left prototype stage.

Recommended by 2 HN people across 2 months · HN mentions 2011–2024

Topics

Testing, debugging & developer toolsGUI, HCI & interface history
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code bubblesidecode visualizationuser interfaceprogramming tools

What people said

zokier · 2022-01 · Strong recommendation

Code Bubbles (from 2010) is the most convincing code visualization tool that I can recall: [VIDEO] Shame it never grew beyond a research prototype.

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stcredzero · 2013-11 · Strong recommendation

> Code folding in a IDE goes a long way to make this bearable. Code folding in IDEs is an indication that we are doing it wrong -- that is, we human beings are programming computers "wrong." I'm not saying that code folding is a symptom. I'm saying that code folding shows how primitive our means of managing code is. It's as if the mesopotamians somehow invented computers, and because of tradition, all code has to be written as cuneiform on wet clay tablets, then fired in ovens before being read. At least text files in directories are digital, but they are as static and behavior-less as clay tablets, and all of the important relationships therein are expressed as implicit correspondences which programmers have to keep track of in their heads. Code Bubbles is a beacon in the direction we should go. [VIDEO]

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thomassmith65 · 2024-05 · Reference

Aha, so that's what happened to Code Bubbles. I saw this video about the project years ago, and always wondered. [VIDEO]

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Sources

Video by AndrewBragdon, played through YouTube.

Data and selection notes

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