What has happened to the development screens for Retool?

Tess:

One other comment.
How do we "View State" like of we want to look at localStorage?

Mike

Hi @mdsmith1 Please don't hesitate to share any and all feedback about the IDE, and I'll make sure it gets to the right team members! We are still actively iterating on user feedback, and we certainly want to ensure it reflects what our users expect to see.

As far as the specific features that you mentioned, view state is on the bottom left panel:

And you can view your code while editing the app or inspecting the components by clicking this code icon in the left panel:

If you prefer the old placement of the code editor, you can use this button on the top left corner to pin the code on the bottom:

For the components tab, I've shared your feedback internally. For context, the new IDE centralizes the most important app building features to a single place to make it easier to learn & easier to find everything, while also optimizing screen space. Additionally, the team was intentional about creating a flow from left to right so that you can drag your component onto the canvas and immediately jump into the inspector without having to switch tabs.

We have some information about the new IDE and other new features in this blog post, which links out to our Developer Day Youtube video. In the video, @jessicasun, shares a demo of the IDE and the thoughts behind the new IDE design. At a high level, the new IDE is more customizable, more user friendly on smaller screen sizes, and has a better code writing experience.

Now that the launch is official, we have some new IDE documentation that is coming out soon!

In addition to sharing feedback with us, you still have the opportunity to opt out of the IDE until August 23rd. If you do so, you'll be prompted to provide the team with your direct feedback

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Tess:
They have launched this thing without the documentation which apparently is coming soon. This reflects a serious failure in the management process. The documentation must come first, it should not be an after thought.

I have figured out out how to get at my code but I can't see how to view my local storage. This used to be under "State". How do I do this?

One other thing, I used to be able to navigate up and down the code list with the arrow keys, this is no longer possible. I think that feature should be restored. Arrow keys permit smoother navigation up and down the list.

Mike

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Like @Tess showed in the previous post What has happened to the development screens for Retool? - #7 by Tess

just click the hamburger (3 stacked lines) and select local storage. You can also access it from Debug section.

CleanShot 2023-08-12 at 14.18.51

I don't agree with all the IDE changes, but you get used to it. If you take 5 minutes clicking around you'll find "the missing stuff" pretty easily and intuitively.

My screen does not have a hamburger (3 staked lines) but I do have a debug button and I was able to find local storage through there.
I agree that once we have habits of screen interactions there is a learning curve to deal with a different IDE. I accept that. But this seems to be change for the sake of change without any improvement in developer performance. We simply click differently and more often to get to the end points that we had before.
I think some burden of proof should be out on the people behind this to explain why they are doing this in the first place.
Mike

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Maybe they'll do a write-up about the IDE and that will suffice?

They certainly put more thought (and explanation) into their UI than most companies. Plus, they beta test with real customers (and you can actually be a part of it, not be schmuck # 129,383 on a waitlist). During the beta of Retool Database, they reached out for a 30-minute call to get my use case & feedback, so I know they're not just simply relying on usage analytics.

Do you like it?

Yes, I do in favor to the new IDE.

I appreciate the "tabbed" window structure for full-screen code and queries, especially on a laptop, as opposed to the old horizontal split that needed constant resizing. On a desktop with multiple monitors, I can then choose a view that's more productive.

Following a left-to-right flow makes sense: start with queries, code, or components, then arrange them on your canvas, and finally customize them.

One issue is that clicking the state icon includes components, forcing you to drag it up to see more state details, which I'd imagine is what most people want 99% of the time. See screenshot. @Tess

On the topic of viewing the state, there is an option when you right click to see the state. This is true for components and queries.

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Yeah, no less than 3 ways to view state, which I can appreciate!

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What started this was viewing local storage which seems to go through convoluted navigation through the debugger.
I can't any other way of getting there. Someone thought it was under the "hamburger" but it is not on my screen.
Mike

Your localStorage value is stored in a component? You can right click on the component to view state
OR on left near bottom:
Screenshot 2023-08-15 at 12.38.49 PM

Scott:
I think there is a mixup about "State" and "Local Storage".

"State" happens to be the place where "Local Storage" was in the old IDE but not in this one.

I am attaching a screen shot of my Local Storage found in the debugger. It is nothing to do with components. Its things about the profiles of customers and financial values associated with an invoice.

I am able to find this OK in the debugger but I find the navigation a little convoluted when it was so much easier in the old IDE.

Mike

That's fair....IMO I think the new IDE is definitely worth getting used to...
I can see my localStorage in an event handler in the component in my app using the left nav icon as I noted above
Screenshot 2023-08-15 at 1.23.53 PM

You know what I never want to have to do on a platform I build, deploy, and host business-critical tools on? Any of that.

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It is an improvement but the ongoing issue with Retool is lack of documentation on releases. Not only in UI changes but codebase changes. Many companies rely on this for internal dev software and its as if you have a developer pushing to production things you have no idea about.

Here, Here!

Mike

Hi @Tess,

Do we have access to the dependency tree in the new IDE? I find this feature very useful, even if it's not perfect.

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Hi @mdsmith1, Thanks so much for sharing your feedback on the localStorage. I've shared it internally as well, and it sounds like the team is in agreement that it's pretty buried. Maybe we can tweak the design a bit for discoverability & ease of use :crossed_fingers:. Another idea they're considering is to bring the state back to the full height of the panel, so it would be comparable to the original IDE. You're welcome to continue to post here on the forums, but if you're interested, I also encourage you to join our Discord for providing early feedback on new products before they launch more broadly

While we're excited about the recent ships from our Developer Day, we definitely appreciate the broader feedback about large scale launches being disruptive, especially when you're developing apps on a time crunch :disappointed:. We’re partnering with a few teams internally to explore how we can get the news out to our community faster. The documentation has been updated to reflect the new IDE, but it sounds like folks here are really looking for a more detailed changelog - what changed with the IDE, what motivated the IDE changes, etc. I’ll post back here when I have updates on that. In regards to general Retool version changelogs, I shared this feedback with our docs team & they let me know they’re currently working on improving our changelog process.

As it relates to version changes, if your team is on Retool Cloud and the weekly updates feel too disruptive, it might be worth exploring our self-hosted platform. With self-hosted, you have to deploy your own Retool instance, but you can choose when your team upgrades versions. We always recommend upgrading to the latest version to get access to new features, but self-hosted allows you to choose when you upgrade and how often.

As always, please continue to share any feedback you have for us!

@ScottR @AnsonHwang thanks for chiming in! Glad to hear you’ve seen value in the new IDE @vinnie thanks for chiming in as well! I’m glad we’ve been able to get your direct input on other betas too Also, @jonj Thanks for pointing out some alternative ways to get the state! (I'm biased to the left panel :sweat_smile:)

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