Earlier quoted context omitted.
So no new languages ever?
That's not what I said at all.
Do you want to describe what the exception is to what you said then?
Show HN: Skillscript – A declarative, sandboxed language for tool orchestration
21–30 of 40 posts
Re: Show HN: Skillscript – A declarative, sandboxed language for tool orchestration
#22It seems like you’re dramatically overcomplicating what could be a 2 bash scripts and a single LLM call. Natural language and LLMs are great for searching the problem space to find a solution, once you find the solution, shrink the stochastic parts (the MD saying “check GitHub” or whatever) and grow the deterministic parts (a bash script) as much as possible.
That's a fair comment. I sorta feel you're describing my thesis, "shrink the stochastic, grow the deterministic" is the point. Where we differ, maybe, is what the deterministic part is made of. The problem I'm trying to solve for me is a step removed. The agent is the one writing the script, and I want it to run unattended against my systems every morning. I can't let it write and run bash. Even though my agent lives…
> The runtime holds the credential and only lets it through the skillscript I approved.
What about skillscript is unique that couldn't be done with bash or python as a permissioned tool? (Trying to understand where you see the difference.)
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My original impression from the repo was that the language/toolkit is overengineered, but then I saw on the website that the intention is for the agents to write their own tools. That helps explain some of the complexity.
I think the rest of the perceived complexity is the over-explaining in the README.
I don't think anyone's going to really engage with all of that so you might have better luck chopping it down 80% to only highlight the stuff that matters.
Re: Show HN: Skillscript – A declarative, sandboxed language for tool orchestration
#23I'm biased since I built a dbt[1] inspired utility[2] that turns markdown into a runnable DAG, but I think a new language is the wrong abstraction.
In a time where people are reading less and less code, introducing a new surface area -- that you don't have a good feel for -- to handle orchestration feels risky.
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Re: Show HN: Skillscript – A declarative, sandboxed language for tool orchestration
#24I'm biased since I built a dbt[1] inspired utility[2] that turns markdown into a runnable DAG, but I think a new language is the wrong abstraction. In a time where people are reading less and less code, introducing a new surface area -- that you don't have a good feel for -- to handle orchestration feels risky. --- [1] https://github.com/dbt-labs/dbt-core [2] https://github.com/pdthq/pdt
Honestly, not far from where I started. The origin of this was "what would a Makefile look like if it built markdown skills?" You'll notice the syntax is very much makefile like.
"new language is the wrong abstraction": I'd resist using "language" as it carries way too much weight here. Closer to your DAG than to a general purpose language.
I guess the way I look at it, if people are reading less and less code, what an agent hands me needs to be small and skimmable. The web tool helps by highlighting ops, and I even built a code to mermaid function (which honestly is there but unused right now) because the skillscripts are generally straightforward.
Skim the examples, I hope you'll see its not that different.
Re: Show HN: Skillscript – A declarative, sandboxed language for tool orchestration
#25Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's a fair comment. I sorta feel you're describing my thesis, "shrink the stochastic, grow the deterministic" is the point. Where we differ, maybe, is what the deterministic part is made of. The problem I'm trying to solve for me is a step removed. The agent is the one writing the script, and I want it to run unattended against my systems every morning. I can't let it write and run bash. Even though my agent lives…
> The runtime holds the credential and only lets it through the skillscript I approved. What about skillscript is unique that couldn't be done with bash or python as a permissioned tool? (Trying to understand where you see the difference.) --- My original impression from the repo was that the language/toolkit is overengineered, but then I saw on the website that the intention is for the agents to write their own tool…
What's the difference? if you're the one writing the Python and approving each script, probably little. The difference shows up when the agent writes it unattended, over and over. Skillscript can only reach the binaries and tools I allowlisted, where I allowlisted them. An agent can't escalate by writing something clever that get by me.
I think you're right on. I let the readme get out of hand. It became a README, changelog mash-up. Going to rewrite it, and the 80% metric is a good one. Is there an example of what you consider the perfect readme?
Re: Show HN: Skillscript – A declarative, sandboxed language for tool orchestration
#26Earlier quoted context omitted.
[flagged]
Brave is Chromium, presumably this means the site is broken on mobile chrome
It's hilarious how emotional and upset sieabahlpark is about this all, complaining about ragebaiting, yet every single one of his posts are sputtering incoherent automatically flagged dead temper tantrums of self loathing rage -- just read his sad posting history and self pitying profile.
https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=sieabahlpark
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48882882
>sieabahlpark 13 hours ago [dead] | prev [–]
>Fuck of Don, you don’t know jack shit about anything these days other than to ragebait to try to remain relevant.
ieabahlpark: I'm truly sorry you're having such a hard time coping with me asking you to simply not to marry someone of your same gender, instead of incessently whining, lashing out, and expressing bigotry.
If it's really that difficult and upsetting for you not to, and you're so emotionally triggered and distraught at the mere mention of human rights for other people, then you really need to look deep inside yourself and reflect, figure out why you're so terrified of other gays getting married while none of them want to marry you, and get some help.
The answer is obvious to all of us except for you, so you've got to figure it out all by yourself. Don't die closeted, angry, self loathing, and alone like Lindsey Graham. Neither of you ever fooled anyone but yourselves.
Nobody will love you until you love yourself. I understand how irrelevant that makes you feel, but no need to lash out and project your butthurt feelings onto me. Have a gay and fabulous day, and I hope you get laid.
Re: Show HN: Skillscript – A declarative, sandboxed language for tool orchestration
#27Earlier quoted context omitted.
> The runtime holds the credential and only lets it through the skillscript I approved. What about skillscript is unique that couldn't be done with bash or python as a permissioned tool? (Trying to understand where you see the difference.) --- My original impression from the repo was that the language/toolkit is overengineered, but then I saw on the website that the intention is for the agents to write their own tool…
What's the difference? if you're the one writing the Python and approving each script, probably little. The difference shows up when the agent writes it unattended, over and over. Skillscript can only reach the binaries and tools I allowlisted, where I allowlisted them. An agent can't escalate by writing something clever that get by me. I think you're right on. I let the readme get out of hand. It became a README, ch…
Re: difference -- Ok, I think I understand. Ultimately, we need a "permissions" layer and you've built a solve for that.
Re: README -- I can't recall a specific repo with one off the top of my head so took a stab at editing yours[1] instead of hunting around. It's not perfect -- I'd want to trim the bullet lists further, for example -- but is much more scannable in my opinion.
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[1] https://gist.github.com/thedatadavis/fbbe556348eb43731659456...
Re: Show HN: Skillscript – A declarative, sandboxed language for tool orchestration
#28Earlier quoted context omitted.
What's the difference? if you're the one writing the Python and approving each script, probably little. The difference shows up when the agent writes it unattended, over and over. Skillscript can only reach the binaries and tools I allowlisted, where I allowlisted them. An agent can't escalate by writing something clever that get by me. I think you're right on. I let the readme get out of hand. It became a README, ch…
Re: difference -- Ok, I think I understand. Ultimately, we need a "permissions" layer and you've built a solve for that. Re: README -- I can't recall a specific repo with one off the top of my head so took a stab at editing yours[1] instead of hunting around. It's not perfect -- I'd want to trim the bullet lists further, for example -- but is much more scannable in my opinion. --- [1] https://gist.github.com/thedatad…
Oh wow. Talking about going above and beyond! Thanks for this. I'll use it as a template for sure. You might have guessed, first time building in public per se. Everything else I do is pretty much for clients and C/C++ work.
Re: Show HN: Skillscript – A declarative, sandboxed language for tool orchestration
#29Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's not what I said at all.
Do you want to describe what the exception is to what you said then?
That should be pretty obvious. How about new programming languages for human beings to use? No reason not to make more of those. But this discussion is about a programming language designed for LLMs to use, not humans. The world doesn't need any more of those.
Design programming languages for humans first. If they're good enough to catch on, and people write lots of code in them, ask and answer lots of questions about them, write tutorial and have hacker news discussions about them, then they will naturally and eventually end up in the training data, and the models will know about them. Problem solved.
It's ridiculous and costly to design a language for LLMs but not humans to use, and then necessarily and repeatedly insert the entire language definition and examples into every single prompt, instead of building it into the model. It's a tragic waste of electricity and money, and has a huge carbon footprint. Why isn't this obvious?
Re: Show HN: Skillscript – A declarative, sandboxed language for tool orchestration
#30It's very nice.. One thing I'd say is the README is a tad long..