[bluejellybean]

The web, and much of programming really, feels so far behind the curve of what's possible as a programmer. Take a dive into shader design in something like unreal engine 5, it sounds exactly like what you're describing in Delphi, mind you, I say this as someone who has never programmed in that language. The ability to drag and drop functions, compose higher levels of abstractions, and really all of the fun programming stuff we do can be accomplished in these engines. I've found it very enlightening, and even somewhat frustrating, to go from drag/dropping some graph nodes that generate a playable world for fun, and then back into the world of javascript for work where I am slinging 100s of lines of text-based code just to get a form button to operate correctly.

[magic_hamster]

In game engines, and especially in UE where things like Blueprints exist, the low level stuff is just conveniently hidden or abstracted away. But the long textual code that makes the button work, eventually exists somewhere in there. At least when you write it yourself, you know who to blame (and probably where to look) when it doesn't work.

[hutzlibu]

"the low level stuff is just conveniently hidden or abstracted away. "

Yes. This this is exactly what I want.

When I write an engine or framework, I will deal with low level stuff. But for basic tasks, I don't want to. But I have to, even where it would not be necessary.

"But the long textual code that makes the button work, eventually exists somewhere in there."

Also there exists even longer textual or even binary code that makes the code for the button work, etc. etc., but I still do not want to deal with it on a daily base. When I make an button, it should be as simple as possible.

Where is it positioned. How is it styled. Where is the onclick method to handle it. Those 3 things I want to do with simple clicks in the IDE.

Everything else is only distracting.

[barrysteve]

I've used UE4 for years and the Blueprints system doesn't save you much. Those abstractions are bricks, made for building brick houses. If you want to build something made out of anything other than brick, you're back to custom HLSL nodes and better off programming your shader somewhere else.

Blueprints are nicer for known problems, they are a better glue for old knowledge, but when you want to do something custom or new, you're out of luck.

This is the same problem with all programming, you can't make something specific and new without doing an engine teardown and rebuilding it. All the parts are terminally interconnected and always will be.

At the end of the day, UE4/5 is a landing pad for all the work you make in other tools. I agree web dev is no fun though.

[pjmlp]

Not wanting to pay for tooling is the major culprit.

One can pay for a CRM like Sitecore, AEM, low code like Outsystems, or enjoy the freedom of manually glueing HTML, JavaScript and JSS.