PG would call that a sitcom startup idea[1]. Sounds nice but who actually wants or needs that? Notice the parent commenter was not speaking from a position of wanting such a product. It just seems to them that it should exist.
What a product like that would theoretically look like is a fully customizable codebase that has drag and drop components. So both the dev and the non-technical person can do everything they want to do.
Thing is: that already exists. Wordpress is that. Along with many other open-source CMS products. The developer can dig in and change whatever they want to their hearts content. And usually they're not going to be happy with that either because of a) how hard it is to learn a huge and changing codebase someone else built and/or b) they're going to think those who built it made a bunch of bad choices and they'd rather just build it from scratch.
So I suppose that provides us a theoretical window for a product that pleases both the content creators and the developers in that regard. It should probably be very easy to learn and customize. Something like:
import { everythingToEveryone } from '@e2ejs';
import homeSpunUi from './bestUiEverBecauseThisDevWroteEverySingleLine.js';
import crapUi from './wordpressUiIfIdiotMarketeersWantIt.js';
import homeSpunComponents from './bestComponentLibraryEverBecauseThisDevWroteIt.js';
import garbageComponents from '/tailwinduiGarbageIfIdiotMarketeersWantIt.js';
// just gonna hardcode this until proven otherwise
const idiotMarketeer = true;
const cms = everythingToEveryone();
cms.ui = idiotMarketeer ? crapUI : homeSpunUi;
cms.components = idiotMarketeer ? garbageComponents : homeSpunComponents;
cms.mount();
A bare-bones, flexible skeleton through which the developer can load whatever they want, 3rd party or of their own creation. And content creators can use through any UI, with any 3rd party products the developer grants them permission to use - in my example, either one the dev rolled themselves, or Wordpress and TailwindUi.
Do I want that or need it? Nope. Does anybody want or need it? Maybe, I guess. The same way maybe some people may want or need a Facebook for horse owners[1]. I'm not going to build it to find out. I'd rather solve an actual problem I have or someone is screaming for others to fix for them.
I’m not saying you’re wrong, but I think you are suggesting a very poor solution to argue that no one wants to have the problem solved? Maybe there are good solutions waiting to be discovered. I think it’s abundantly clear that lots of organizations would have use for a smoother way to collaborate between developers, designers and content creators.
To colour within the lines, the designer needs to fully understand what the dev limitations are, which are often complex to summarize and a moving target. How do you easily explain what CSS can do natively in most browsers for example?
Often I see designers work in isolation to get something signed off for development and then the developer gets lumped with coding it however tricky it might be.
My view is designers and developers need to iterate and work closely together from the very start to develop an understanding of what's practical and make compromises both ways vs it being a one way street.
Isn't all these components a solution to some actual problem, but just not your problem.
Could you give an example of the type of actual problem you are thinking about? Then we could discuss why there is no component that solves it already?
I was not referring to the submitted product but to the comment above:
>In general I have a concern about these types of products. All these page builder products are so far from actual programming, that I feel like there is a huge chasm between pagebuilders and building custom components.
What I meant was that the chasm doesn't really exist, as you can theoretically already do anything you want with an open source CMS. Building another one wouldn't bridge that chasm it'd just provide yet another CMS product to an already crowded market.
> Could you give an example of the type of actual problem you are thinking about? Then we could discuss why there is no component that solves it already?
Personally, I don't have any. The CMS landscape is filled with all sorts of awesome packages (including perhaps the one submitted here, I haven't tried it yet). My approach is to roll my own with a bunch of individual pieces that others have built (like the TipTap editor). So basically the fictional EverythingToEveryone but without someone providing me a wrapper.
A good wake up call comment for founders. Maybe some human do it to themselves, reality of people don't accept technical solutions throwing at them, because some human behaviour prevents it.
What a product like that would theoretically look like is a fully customizable codebase that has drag and drop components. So both the dev and the non-technical person can do everything they want to do.
Thing is: that already exists. Wordpress is that. Along with many other open-source CMS products. The developer can dig in and change whatever they want to their hearts content. And usually they're not going to be happy with that either because of a) how hard it is to learn a huge and changing codebase someone else built and/or b) they're going to think those who built it made a bunch of bad choices and they'd rather just build it from scratch.
So I suppose that provides us a theoretical window for a product that pleases both the content creators and the developers in that regard. It should probably be very easy to learn and customize. Something like:
A bare-bones, flexible skeleton through which the developer can load whatever they want, 3rd party or of their own creation. And content creators can use through any UI, with any 3rd party products the developer grants them permission to use - in my example, either one the dev rolled themselves, or Wordpress and TailwindUi.Do I want that or need it? Nope. Does anybody want or need it? Maybe, I guess. The same way maybe some people may want or need a Facebook for horse owners[1]. I'm not going to build it to find out. I'd rather solve an actual problem I have or someone is screaming for others to fix for them.
[1] http://paulgraham.com/startupideas.html