# Teliva - an environment for end-user programming

> “Enable all people to modify the software they use in the course of using it.”
> — https://futureofcoding.org/episodes/033.html

> “What if we, and all computer users, could reach in and modify our favorite apps?”
> — https://www.inkandswitch.com/end-user-programming

> “Software must be as easy to change as it is to use.”
> — https://malleable.systems

## What's this, then?

An extremely naïve, [brutalist](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brutalist_architecture)
attempt at packaging up simple [Lua](http://www.lua.org) apps with almost all
the stuff needed to edit and build them. You will need some Unix-like
platform[1] with a C compiler and the ncurses and openssl libraries.

Here's how you run one of the example apps (the [Tower of Hanoi](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tower_of_Hanoi)):

```
git clone https://github.com/akkartik/teliva
cd teliva
make linux
src/teliva hanoi.tlv
```

<img alt='screenshot of Teliva running the Towers of Hanoi' src='doc/hanoi.png'>

No matter what app you run, you are always guaranteed access to a single
obvious, consistent way (currently the hotkey `ctrl-e`) to edit its sources.
And to run the updates after editing. ([video](https://archive.org/details/akkartik-2021-11-14))

[1] Tested so far on Linux, Mac OS X and OpenBSD; should also work on other
flavors of BSD, WSL on Windows, etc. with only minor modifications.

## Isn't this just an IDE?

There's one big difference: these apps are not intended to be runnable outside
of the Teliva environment. Editing the sources will always be a core feature
that's front and center in the UI.

A second, more subtle difference: it's primarily an environment for _running_
apps, and only secondarily for editing them. Starting up the environment puts
you in a running app by default. Creating an app from a clean slate is a
low-priority use case, as is lots of specialized support for developing
complex apps. The sweet spot for Teliva is simple apps that people will want
to edit after using for a while.

## Why Lua?

It's reputedly the fastest interpreted language per line of implementation
code.

## Will it run any Lua program?

Not quite. My priority is providing a good experience for newcomers to
comprehend and modify the programs they use. If it's not clear how to provide
that experience for some kinds of Lua programs, I'd rather disable support for
them in Teliva and let people use regular Lua. Or other platforms!

- This approach doesn't make sense for batch programs, I think. I also don't
  yet have a good story for building server 16-08-16