The Sinclair QL Forum

Hi guys.

I'd like to point out before I continue, I'm not a die hard QL fan. In fact, I've never owned one. I also don't much like SuperBASIC, Q/DOS or SMSQE.

I do however, love the architecture of the Q40. It's a great little platform for developing on.

For some years now, I have been toying with a graphical programming system. A zero code system where you draw programs by connecting up instructions.
Anyway, a video of what I have been using my Q40 for.
https://www.youtube.com/embed/IEuhO2V094M

Edit - why doesn't the |YouTube| button work?

Hi,

Excellent video, showing the graphical power of the Q40.

The concept of a graphics programming language reminds me of :
- Scratch - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scratch_( ... _language)
- Bridgepoint xtUML tool - https://www.uml-diagrams.org/index-examples.html
Bridgepoint diagrams had boxes that actually had code in them, but the linkage between the code segments was done graphically.

Tim

I beg to differ about scratch. Scratch is just a way of dragging and dropping procedural code to make a program. It's still linear and it still ends up looking like many other languages.

UML on the other hand is yes, and ultimately where I'd like to take the idea. Procedures that can be customised by the end user. Imagine if the links between blocks were e-mails or invoices. The users could design their own workflow.

But, this is big business stuff. No one wants to listen to little ol' me. They've got their big systems that they paid millions for.

So, I'm starting small. 32 bit microcontrollers, and educational tool for building robots and gadgets.

...Scratch maybe okay for childern and beginners, but does seem a good programming language to me.

But then it from MIT so got be goood... maybe!?

As an aside, the human language switching whilst the computer logic remains the same reminds me a bit of Borland's ObjectVision (which I used briefly under OS/2 back in the day), which also used a visual programming approach. So the english SUM() might be SOMME() in French, but still do the same thing. Nice.