{"id":32456,"date":"2021-05-12T17:07:47","date_gmt":"2021-05-12T21:07:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/?p=32456"},"modified":"2021-05-12T17:09:07","modified_gmt":"2021-05-12T21:09:07","slug":"diet-coda-discontinued","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mjtsai.com\/blog\/2021\/05\/12\/diet-coda-discontinued\/","title":{"rendered":"Diet Coda Discontinued"},"content":{"rendered":"

Michael Buckley<\/a> (Hacker News<\/a>):<\/p>\n

\n

Unfortunately, like Transmit iOS and Status Board before it, we’re discontinuing Code Editor as it doesn’t generate enough revenue to cover its continued development.<\/p>\n

[…]<\/p>\n

The churn of new web tools and tech is rapid and constant. This is why having a flexible extension system is essential for a modern web-focused IDE. But that’s where the trouble lies.<\/p>\n

The biggest technical hurdle is the inability to run external processes on iOS and iPadOS. There’s just no way around it: this is required for modern web development.<\/p>\n

[…]<\/p>\n

Even if it were viable, we’d likely run afoul of App Store policy as well. Apps on iOS and iPadOS must use Apple’s Javascript interpreter, JavaScriptCore. Although JavaScriptCore is excellent, many developer tools rely on features or behaviors only present in Google’s V8 JavaScript interpreter. Similarly, WebKit is the only allowed web rendering engine on iOS.<\/p>\n

And still, even if we could find some clever technical way around all of these limitations, we wouldn’t know if our approaches would be allowed on the App Store until we’d fully built and submitted them for review. So, we’d be facing a huge investment of time with the possibility that it would all ultimately get rejected.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n

Nick Heer<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Panic has tried to crack this nut multiple times without success, but it is hard to see how any developer can make iOS work for apps like these. We all know that Panic makes great software, it has enthusiastic users, and it has long been a high-profile independent developer. Even if iOS is out of the question, evidence is mounting that Apple is kneecapping iPadOS by continuing to treat it with the same kinds of developer and app distribution rules as a smartphone.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n

Mike Rockwell<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\n

I probably sound like a broken record at this point, but this is yet another example of why Apple needs to open up the platform. Not just so developers can explore other options for monetization, but to loosen up the arbitrary restrictions on what is even possible on the platform. How many apps like Code Editor do we have to lose before Apple wakes up?<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n

Previously:<\/p>\n