Alpha Testers needed for developing a Open-source WYSIWYG Designer for Vaad

Hi, dear community!
I am currently developing a Open-source WYSIWYG Designer for Vaadin Flow (14.4). Currently, the designer is not yet stable and still has some missing features. It currently only produces Java code and can only consume Java code generated with the editor itself.
The development has stagnated since this is quite a large project for a single person, also due to some missing people willing to test the designer. This is where you could help me :). [If you are interested you may download and try the designer under this link.]
(https://github.com/appreciated/designer-for-flow/releases) All platforms should be supported. But do not expect too much the designer is still in (pre-) alpha.

Regards Johannes.

Hi,

That will probably be a huge work. I’ve tried the application and open an issue. When I import the project I can’t create a new view (I might be due to the issue).

You have a nice way to open the issue with the stacktrace :slight_smile:

Hi thanks for giving it a try!
I fixed it, the next alpha should no longer have this issue.

\u0000This is a cool effort, I’ll definitely give it a try. No Apple Silicon build available yet? \uD83E\uDD2A

\u0000> Matti Tahvonen:\n> This is a cool effort, I’ll definitely give it a try. No Apple Silicon build available yet? \uD83E\uDD2A \n\nSorry not yet, totally forgot about that one. Fingers crossed that electron already supports it. I will keep you up-to-date when I add it (sometime tonight). I hope that it will work on the first try since I cannot tell if the build actually works \uD83D\uDE01.

I couldn’t make it start with my M1 MacbookPro. Might be related to the arm based architecture. I might try later with my old laptop, but don’t count on me.

I added a arm64 Build for MacOS for the release “v14.4.0-alpha.2”. I hope it works!

Some signing issue is preventing to open it altogether. The x64 version was opened, when explicitly given right via system settings.
18544088.jpg

\u0000Checked with bit older Mac. Some startup hickup there as well, similar as I had with this m1 mac with x86 emulation.\n\nNext up, checkout and running directly the underlaying SB app \uD83E\uDD13!
18544122.jpg

While waiting for dependencies to download, I’d suggest your to come up with some other name for the application. It is bit on the crash course with Vaadin Designer. Flow Builder was about to be my initial suggestion, but all good names seem to be picked, Salesforce has something with that name…

This isn’t a glory day for my new Mac :slight_smile: Now it failed with a vaadin build…

[INFO]
 Installing node version v12.18.4
[INFO]
 Downloading https://nodejs.org/dist/v12.18.4/node-v12.18.4-darwin-arm64.tar.gz to /Users/mstahv/.m2/repository/com/github/eirslett/node/12.18.4/node-12.18.4-darwin-arm64.tar.gz
[INFO]
 No proxies configured
[INFO]
 No proxy was configured, downloading directly
[INFO]
 ------------------------------------------------------------------------
[INFO]
 BUILD FAILURE
[INFO]
 ------------------------------------------------------------------------
[INFO]
 Total time:  02:19 min
[INFO]
 Finished at: 2021-03-03T18:18:47+02:00
[INFO]
 ------------------------------------------------------------------------
[ERROR]
 Failed to execute goal com.github.eirslett:frontend-maven-plugin:1.10.0:install-node-and-npm (install node) on project designer-for-flow: Could not download Node.js: Got error code 404 from the server. -> [Help 1]

[ERROR]
 
[ERROR]
 To see the full stack trace of the errors, re-run Maven with the -e switch.
[ERROR]
 Re-run Maven using the -X switch to enable full debug logging.
[ERROR]
 
[ERROR]
 For more information about the errors and possible solutions, please read the following articles:
[ERROR]
 [Help 1]
 http://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/MAVEN/MojoFailureException

\u0000My bad, it was actually the production profile trying to create the electron package. Now running when executed directly form the IDE \uD83D\uDC4D

Nice! A lot of things that could be improved still in the UX, but it was quite easy to create my first test view.

As editing code manually is not supported, do you have some best practices for the usage? Extend the visually designed view or just use if to create the first draft and then continue with code?

18544145.jpg

Wow you actually build it, good to see it works on a Mac too. With all that eletron stuff I wasn’t too sure.
Have you tried moving the build app to the application folder?
When executing it somewhere else Apple seems to run it in some kind of sandbox.
I am very open to changes of any kind, the product name can be changed. No need to be on a crash course with the Vaadin designer. Just an appealing name where most users get the idea. Also the UX is subject to change. Thats why I want to do the testing primarily.
I recommend extending the visually created code.

I actually didn’t build the Electron bundle, just run it directly form IDE and then using it using local browser. I can try to make the Electron bundle or to use the pre-built via Applications directory later today.

Matti Tahvonen:
I actually didn’t build the Electron bundle, just run it directly form IDE and then using it using local browser. I can try to make the Electron bundle or to use the pre-built via Applications directory later today.

Let me know if it worked!