I checked out this page for language requests at repl.it: https://replit.canny.io/languages-requests/p/nim
and Nim has 94 votes, putting it at 3rd place after Julia (118 votes, AND which is now getting implemented on repl.it) and Scala (158), plus it's ahead of Elixir(83) and Crystal(18), and even TypeScript(90). Lots of love for Nim! :)
I feel getting Nim on this site might help exposure greatly with beginners, many click through different languages to check out their syntax and examples. Plus the share feature is pretty handy for sharing code examples and can also be embedded by iframe or in Medium blogs, and by teachers via the teacher dashboard (handy if any school wanted to adopt Nim as a default beginners language).
Do we need a working repl to achieve this? They have the gcc/g++ compilers already implemented, so possibly it could just run like the playground, without a repl. I wouldn't consider myself intermediate yet so no chance I could help code it (I could probably offer some ported C and JS beginner examples though).
I use the playground along with vs code/code runner, not knocking that great utility, but it doesn't hurt to have a backup pad either.
Any interest?
The compiler is currently undergoing final changes to make it work as a library, so I would wait until the new release.
repl.it's case is weird in that C, C++ and Rust all try to compile the REPL input into a program instead of evaluating expressions, which can be done for essentially any language and doesn't make repl.it special when that's already done for Nim in TIO and Codewars and the playground.
I didn't know about TIO's Nim page, cheers that's not bad, and like repl.it (and unlike the playground) you can share gists/urls (the playground's doesn't work), it has a Ctrl-Enter keyboard shortcut to compile it, and the editor remains focused after compilation for less mousing around. It doesn't accept user input either though, same as the playground, but which the repl site does.
Unfortunately it doesn't have any syntax colouring, or add indentation, that's a shame...a bit rough on the eyes, and a bit slower to code in.
https://tio.run/##y8vM/f8/NTkjX0HJIzUnJ18hPL8oJ0WJi@v/fwA
You can't use codewars without registering, plus even after registering I haven't worked out how to start a simple scratchpad in Nim...I'd say that rules it out of being beginner friendly, I don't think anybody but the already commited would bother.
A proper nim repl would require quite an effort, so they'd better stick to playground-like experience or use smth like https://github.com/AndreiRegiani/INim, which looks like a repl, and might work as it for quite a lot use cases.
That said hosting yet another repl or playground on repl.it would surely be beneficial for Nim promotion.
iNim is close enough for playing around with, I prefer a playground-style pad for coding in.
The Haxe pad is not bad actually, it shows you it's compiled js code as well as the output. It'd be pretty epic if we had tabs for C, C++ and JS compiled code as well as the output! https://try.haxe.org/#1f842
Do we need a working repl to achieve this? They have the gcc/g++ compilers already implemented, so possibly it could just run like the playground, without a repl.
Nope. You should email them about simply implementing it in their service :)
You should email them about simply implementing it in their service :)
I got a reply back today from repl.it, to my email asking if they would consider including Nim in their languages on repl.it.
Thanks for reaching out - we're hoping to open source our language system soon
so that the community can add the languages they want to see on Repl.it -
we're a bit swamped right now as our team is only 5 people strong,
so we're hoping to get some help from our users by open sourcing languages.
As I understand it, it's as simple as including a dockerfile plus some config files,
so hopefully you will find it easy to add Nim then. :)
Best,
Tim