Svelte: If the REPL can keep its content, it'd be great to send other people sample code

[KennethKinLum]

Right now if I have some code sample on the Svelte REPL, I can send people some code samples:

https://svelte.dev/repl/64635232b5784bfa8997192ced12acd4?version=3.18.1

but if I forgot and a few days later come back and edited some code to experiment and saved it and didn't save a good version at the end, or just experimented with it and saved some bad code and then fork another version, now the version I sent to other people won't work any more.

Can it act somewhat like jsfiddle, so that a version of sample code, some URL like:

https://svelte.dev/repl/64635232b5784bfa8997192ced12acd4/12?version=3.18.1

(URL won't work, just a sample) So that the 12 is the minor version? So I can send to other people version 01 or 03, and I can keep on editing the code into version 4, 5, 6, 7 and it won't affect the version I sent to people?

Otherwise, I can in a few days, forgot that I sent to other people and edit that version. It'd fine if I fork another version and never touch that original version, but sometimes which URL is which might be forgotten and the original version is used and edited.

[KennethKinLum]

it is true that I can fork another page B and just work on that page B. But there are times I have bookmarks in my browser, or that I kept a code sample and its REPL URL in my Google docs. So I might re-visit a page without knowing that I should not modify it because 12 days ago, I sent it to somebody.

[TehShrike]

It would take a decent amount of work to implement version-awareness with a decent UI in the REPL. I suspect that if it were well-implemented, that functionality would be accepted, but I think you'd have to be the one to implement it.

Things to consider:

• you would want to show "there's a newer version of this code" to someone viewing an older version
• you would need to list all versions/changes to a given REPL app somewhere

In the meantime, the way that I personally mitigate that kind of risk is by giving my REPL apps a name before linking to them from somewhere else. That way you have a clue as to whether or not an old REPL might be risky to change.

[rixo]

Couldn't this be solved with a permalink to a REPL for this precise version of the code?

You use this for sharing and no problem if you break everything afterward.

Indeed, a notification that a newer version of the code exists would be a nice to have ("it might be better, worse, or completely different ¯\_(ツ)_/¯").

[TehShrike]

The REPL used to have every saved version be a permalink. The behavior changed when the REPL switched from storing code on Gist to storing it in a database. Some people seemed fairly happy with the change in behavior, so it would probably be tough to convince everyone to switch back to the all-permalink-all-the-time implementation.

But like I said, if you're willing to implement a multiple-version-aware version of the REPL with good UI, you could probably get folks on board.

[Conduitry]

I'd definitely be into that if we can come up with a good way to convey 'copy this link to share this version, copy this link to share whatever future versions you might make'.

[chapmanjacobd]

maybe you could just have a lock button ("lock this code") and when you click on it the code will be saved in a different place and the "locked" pages will still be editable but they won't auto-save.

because this is different behavior you could do

// Enable navigation prompt
window.onbeforeunload = function() {
    return true;
};
// Remove navigation prompt
window.onbeforeunload = null;

to make sure people know that the code is read only

[tomByrer]

I've seen various editors use an URL like: https://host/slug/version
So:
https://svelte.dev/repl/15200f778a624c66b59dc53b6d8f3b3c/0?version=3.20.0
is the original save,
https://svelte.dev/repl/15200f778a624c66b59dc53b6d8f3b3c/1?version=3.20.0
will be the second save
https://svelte.dev/repl/15200f778a624c66b59dc53b6d8f3b3c/2?version=3.20.0
is the next save, etc.

multiple-version-aware version of the REPL with good UI,

Just a dropdown of all the save versions would be the first round IMHO.