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Why Don't We Have a General-Purpose Tree Editor? (2014)

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Re: Why Don't We Have a General-Purpose Tree Editor? (2014)

#181

Post by arxpoetica »

audunw wrote: post #107
crdoconnor wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>What I've concluded, is that we don't have a good representation for a general purpose tree editor to work on. Roughly speaking, S-expressions are just a bit too simple, and XML is way too complicated. Ummm json??

I was wrong about S-expressions. S-expressions are roughly the right complexity, or even a bit too complex, depending on how you look at it. JSON is way too complex. JSONS assumes that you have an object/record structure (labels and values), and gives you both objects and arrays with which to build tree structures.

JSON is one of the most dominant tree-data formats on the web because of the awesome balance it has between complexity and simplicity. JSON fits the bill nicely.

Re: Why Don't We Have a General-Purpose Tree Editor? (2014)

#182

Post by YeGoblynQueenne »

vog wrote: post #179
YeGoblynQueenne wrote: post #176

>> We need a solid, simple program that can simply edit trees. I might be misunderstanding this but a "tree" is a graph, so formally a tuple G = {V,E} where V a set of vertices {a,b,c,....} and E a set of tuples: {{a,b}, {b,c},...} so that each a,b,c,... are vertices in V. So for instance, the graph: a | / \ b c | | d e Would be written as {{V,E}: V = {a,b,c,d,e}, E = {{a,b},{a,c},{b,d},{c,e}}} possibly accompanied b…

> {{V,E}: V = {a,b,c,d,e}, E = {{a,b},{a,c},{b,d},{c,e}}} possibly accompanied by a statement as to whether edges are directed or not. From a math notation point of view, this statement is not needed. If your edges are directed, denote your edges not as sets (which are always unordered in math), but as ordered pairs instead: {{V,E}: V = {a,b,c,d,e}, E = {(a,b),(a,c),(b,d),(c,e)}}

Thanks. Or you can always use what I think is slightly informal notation, where a directed edge is notated as a -> b (I've seen that in textbooks, but I'm not sure where it's coming from).

Re: Why Don't We Have a General-Purpose Tree Editor? (2014)

#184

Post by achamayou »

jcoffland wrote: post #173

Trees are graphs with out cycles but you always end up adding cycles. Code is no exception. There have been endless attempts to create coding systems based on graphs. These systems promise extraordinary modularity and reusability and an ease of programming which will allow anyone to construct complex software with a few clicks and drags. So far everyone of these systems that I have seen in the last 25 years has falle…

Sometimes not being able to add cycles is a design goal. For example if you're exposing a user-facing DSL and it's in the shared interest of the users and the backend that their scripts always terminate, perhaps even in a bounded amount of time/cycle.

Just because a tool can't solve all problems in their generality doesn't make it automatically worthless, there are situations where less is truly more.

Re: Why Don't We Have a General-Purpose Tree Editor? (2014)

#185

Post by juliend2 »

d0lph wrote: post #79

Workflowy is pretty nice, it exports to plain text and xml. https://workflowy.com/

I tend to use https://www.omnigroup.com/omnioutliner/, but workflowy is especially useful when I need a list to be shared.

I also like mermaid (https://github.com/knsv/mermaid), so I created a small rails app (https://github.com/juliend2/metaglue) that uses mermaid as the graph language, and it generates an SVG graph in realtime. I really like it and use it as a kind of brain dump for various subjects. The idea behind it is to collect any kind of data (bits of knowledge) and mash them all together inside a common graph.

Re: Why Don't We Have a General-Purpose Tree Editor? (2014)

#186

Post by 50CNT »

charlieflowers wrote: post #160
bitexploder wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't forget org mode or mind mapping software. Both are quite able with hierarchical data.

Can you (or anyone) name some good mind mapping software (other than org mode)?

When I'm not using orgmode I usually use yED[0] for diagrams and graphs. Not specifically mind-mapping software, but close enough for my purposes.

[0]https://www.yworks.com/products/yed

Re: Why Don't We Have a General-Purpose Tree Editor? (2014)

#187

Post by jcao219 »

unhammer wrote: post #177
stcredzero wrote: post #149

The key insight of this post for me is this: Code editing is tree editing! The reason why code is edited in text editors, is that tree editing interfaces are fundamentally difficult to do well, and often have to be carefully tuned to the properties of the particular trees and editing tasks. (Simple examples: Huge fanout vs. at most 2 children. Very large information-rich nodes vs. tiny nodes.) In the early days of pr…

def f = x = readline; g x def g x = print x; f

The AST of that would still be a tree. AST does not concern itself with the semantics of the language, only its syntax.

Re: Why Don't We Have a General-Purpose Tree Editor? (2014)

#188

Post by bitexploder »

charlieflowers wrote: post #160
bitexploder wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't forget org mode or mind mapping software. Both are quite able with hierarchical data.

Can you (or anyone) name some good mind mapping software (other than org mode)?

Freemind is alright. Java. Does the basics. Runs everywhere. Open source.
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