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CMD-Geek (a Batch-IDE)

Posted: 09 Jun 2015 01:38
by CMD-Geek
Hi guys,

we would like to introduce a little project from us to you. It is called the "CMD-Geek".

The „CMD-Geek“ is an IDE (development environment) for the Windows Batch-Script. This IDE includes a Database who contains all Batch-Commands from XP up to Win 10 and can present them all with their syntax and description. The „CMD-Geek“ is currently in private development and is in need of support to cover the costs of Licenses, Development and Software-Support.

We even have a little Demo-version on the CMD-Geek website who you can find over here: http://cmd-geek.net/

If you wish to support us, you can do it with good feedback or getting your own version over here: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/271838394/cmd-geek

We thank you all for your support and for your honest feedback!

With good Greetings

The Dev-Team

Re: CMD-Geek (a Batch-IDE)

Posted: 11 Jun 2015 23:19
by AiroNG
Maybe it's just me but what's the point in having such a program?
If i do not know how a command works i could always go

Code: Select all

[command] /?

and i'll get all the information i need about the command...

Where would the learning effect be if a program corrects my syntax?
Maybe my syntax is advanced and explicitly needed in the way i write it
(i.e. Macros or other weird functions that should never ever work but do so nonetheless...).

Does your program take that into account?

cmd-geek.net is down at the moment.

And one more thing that is 100% my opinion:
If you advertise a product to receive funding then please ask one of your
developers if (s)he or anyone (s)he knows can review your advertising text.
Being the the way i am i couldn't help but cringe while reading the
text on your kickstarter page. Proper use of the chosen language goes
a long way in securing peoples interest.

Nice idea though. If your website with the demo comes back online i'll take it for a spin.

p.s.:
I do NOT want to be sarcastic or condescending with this post. It's just honest feedback.

Re: CMD-Geek (a Batch-IDE)

Posted: 12 Jun 2015 01:56
by CMD-Geek
Hi,

thank you for your feedback!

We know that we don't do anything for the top-professionals of batch-scripting.
The CMD-Geek should help everyone who wants to learn or has very less experience with batch-scripting.

And you are right that you could get the syntax over a /? command at the most times, but we (want to) offer a search-engine where you can find commands and sub-commands with the needed function. Also it is possible to "complete" a command when it is written with the "Tab"-key. Just try it.

The Website is fine. You can download the Demo all the time. We just updated the Website so you should just reach it over the following link: http://www.cmd-geek.net/

Thank you for your support and honest feedback!

Re: CMD-Geek (a Batch-IDE)

Posted: 12 Jun 2015 03:15
by foxidrive
CMD-Geek wrote:We know that we don't do anything for the top-professionals of batch-scripting.
The CMD-Geek should help everyone who wants to learn or has very less experience with batch-scripting.

And you are right that you could get the syntax over a /? command at the most times, but we (want to) offer a search-engine where you can find commands and sub-commands with the needed function.


There has been a thread at one time on how to extract all the help text from a batch file. I believe it was on this forum.

Your project has to cater for other languages too, or is English the only language you will support?

Also it is possible to "complete" a command when it is written with the "Tab"-key. Just try it.


It will only complete the name or directory name in the current folder - if you type cop and then press TAB it will not give you copy

Re: CMD-Geek (a Batch-IDE)

Posted: 12 Jun 2015 03:41
by CMD-Geek
hi,

foxidrive wrote:
CMD-Geek wrote:
Your project has to cater for other languages too, or is English the only language you will support?

Also it is possible to "complete" a command when it is written with the "Tab"-key. Just try it.


It will only complete the name or directory name in the current folder - if you type cop and then press TAB it will not give you copy


We will try to offer the command-database in different languages but we need support for that.

The "Tab"-function is releated to the CMD-Geek wher you can complete the command with a push of the "Tab"-Key. Like you can see in the Demo.

Re: CMD-Geek (a Batch-IDE)

Posted: 12 Jun 2015 04:36
by Ed Dyreen
AiroNG wrote:Where would the learning effect be if a program corrects my syntax?
Every modern development environment automatically highlights syntax errors and offers suggestions even after typing a single letter. Like for example Eclipse for Java. The only difference between a development environment that automatically checks syntax and a syntax check at run time is that the latter requires the program to be run only to see it crash, that's not better at all and certainly much slower. You want to learn the hard way or the easy way which is using a development environment even professionals don't want to go without ?

@CMD-Geek
I find that a development environment for batch is absurd because batch programming is based on exploits, that is, we exploit bugs or 'features' of a command or a series of commands to make it do something totally different than it was originally designed to do ( also known as hacking ).

Due to this it is extremely hard to figure out what syntax is correct and what is wrong. Also new 'features' of batch are still being discovered as we speak. On top of that comes the fact that batch is poorly document and sometimes the Microsoft docs are simply wrong. To make things even worse, batch not only behaves differently on every OS, but even between different Service Packs.

I fear that when I run the development environment that it will highlight a correct hack as a syntax error, like I've seen before.

I want to make sure you realize the culprits and challenges that come with developing a batch IDE. Many have tried, and failed because the goals they had set were too unrealistic. As far as I know, not a single batch IDE has ever been embraced and widely adopted by the DOSTips community.

Re: CMD-Geek (a Batch-IDE)

Posted: 18 Jun 2015 20:55
by ShadowThief
About your website
  • White text on a grey background is incredibly hard to read. At the very least, have a black border around the text.
  • Literally the only necessary hyphen on your main page is the one in the word "know-how" at the very bottom.

About the program
  • Your buttons need tooltips for what they do. It's nice that you've included a manual, but you can't expect me to keep that open while I'm using your program.
  • I'd recommend a third window for errors instead of including them in the output window.
  • The button to uncomment code doesn't do anything, and when all of the code is commented and you click the uncomment button, the program crashes.
  • Tab-completion doesn't work; the cursor just goes from the batch code window to the protocol code window.
  • I can't change executions mode. It's fine if you've disabled that for the demo version, but you should say so somewhere.
  • chkdsk, compact, fc, find, findstr, ntbackup, route, msiexec, chkntfs, cmstp, doskey, hostname, logman, mode, mountvol, pentnt, rasdial, rexec, systeminfo, unlodctr, ver, cscript, echo, and expand give OutOfRange exceptions when you select them from the dropdown menu.
  • nslookup, telnet, tfpt, sfc, type, and vssadmin don't have a pop-up window when you select it from the dropdown menu.
  • label is misspelled as lable.
  • You include pushd under Service Commands, but not popd.
  • setlocal has enableextensions and disableextensions in its completion window, but not enabledelayedexpansion or disabledelayedexpansion.
  • About 50% of the text is still in German.

Re: CMD-Geek (a Batch-IDE)

Posted: 18 Jun 2015 23:11
by Aacini
ShadowThief wrote:About your website
  • White text on a grey background is incredibly hard to read. At the very least, have a black border around the text.

I tried to test the site, but after "read" half a page I tired of the effort to try to distinguish the characters with the very poor contrast, so I gived up...

Antonio