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Bootstrapping Urbit from Ethereum

urbit.org

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Re: Bootstrapping Urbit from Ethereum

#121

Post by steveklabnik »

mrkgnao wrote: post #113
pcmonk wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> not all of the last 30 odd years of systems and programming research was pointless. Indeed, which is why it's a shame our primary server OSes (Unix-likes) can't incorporate them. Urbit can. As for what are the approaches different, there have been many words spilled over that, but here's a few examples to wit, most of which exist in one or two other systems, but aren't widely used: - All events are transactions, do…

Rust uses Hindley-Milner type inference. OCaml uses Hindley-Milner. Swift apparently uses a variant of the system with more features. None of these make use of monads or anything rooted in category theory. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hindley%E2%80%93Milner_type_sy... HM is a type system that also gives you an algorithm to infer types without having to do the "List foo = new ArrayList ()" dance from languages withou…

(Rust doesn't use Hindley-Milner, though the plan is to try to move closer to it in the future)

Re: Bootstrapping Urbit from Ethereum

#122

Post by occultist_throw »

tptacek wrote: post #41
chc4 wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm one of those people that get it, so I'll try to explain it without going off the deep end and waxing poetically about planets or whatever. Urbit is a platform for building decentralized apps. To that end, it's a tightly integrated set of different features that play into that: an identity system so that all the apps can refer to the same people by the same handle, a typed RPC network for easy message sending, and…

This is a good, well-written explanation of the most reasonable, mainstream aspects of Urbit, leaving the impression that it's essentially like a P2P version of AWS Lambda. But of course, that's not all it is. It's also a ground-up reinvention of mainstream functional programming languages like Lisp, built on the foundation of an abstract virtual machine in which the "decrement" operation can be performed natively on…

> You don't have to memorize the new names they've come up with for most of the ASCII punctuation characters, like "gal", "gar", and "hax" for "", and "#", "but it helps". A normal engineer's reaction to a system that tells it that it will help to remember a new name for the pound sign is to ask "Why? What fresh horror lurks in the deeper meaning of your new name for the percent sign? And why won't you tell me before I commit to this system?"

Speaking of that.. I looked again at the reference documentation and the "hello world" (Fizzbuzz). It feels like I'm playing a game of Magic the Gathering on another world, with different physics and vocalizations I cannot do.

https://urbit.org/docs/hoon/reference/

     {$book p/(list {{aura @} moss})}: mold which recognizes a union tagged by head atom.
     {$lamb p/moss q/moss}: mold which normalizes to an example gate.
     {$port p/moss q/seed}: form an iron gate.
     {$gill p/moss q/seed}: form a gill, a wet one-armed core with sample.
     {$gasp p/seed q/seed}: form a gate with burnt sample.
Uhm.. What? I know I'm reading words. But part of it makes me feel like Im also in Game of Thrones. Iron Gate, wet one-armed core, and a burnt sample?

And their demo (Fizzbuzz) is just as illegible. https://urbit.org/docs/hoon/demo/ . I get programming. I know there's concepts in different langs that need understood. But one thing I know is that the demo should be easy to dip your toes in.

And it starts. "Tape" is really a string. "Home Desk" -Im guessing its the urbit home directory for your user? Urbit Pier? No bloody clue. But Im supposed to copy the file (oh wait, is file even used, or maybe its joobpflep?) to it. But at least the "Urbit Dojo" is the shell.

Re: Bootstrapping Urbit from Ethereum

#123

Post by imtringued »

chc4 wrote: post #28
aeontech wrote: post #14

Every time I read something about Urbit I am reminded of the Lewis Padgett short sci-fi story, "Mimsy Were The Borogroves" [0], [1] describing children discovering alien future toys, and subsequently via use of those toys learning to manipulate reality in incomprehensible ways. I still have not been able to figure out if there's actually something that amazing about Urbit, or if behind the obfuscated terminology ther…

I'm one of those people that get it, so I'll try to explain it without going off the deep end and waxing poetically about planets or whatever. Urbit is a platform for building decentralized apps. To that end, it's a tightly integrated set of different features that play into that: an identity system so that all the apps can refer to the same people by the same handle, a typed RPC network for easy message sending, and…

Federated systems are the middle ground between full centralisation (one provider) and decentralisation (everyone is a provider). They allow users to choose between the two depending on what they actually want.

With decentralised systems you are forced to run all computation and store all data yourself. The average user isn't going to buy their own server and run it 24/7. That's incredibly wasteful. Even in the best case scenario they will just get an "urbit server" from AWS or somewhere else.

The problem with centralised services isn't that they are centralised. The problem is that you are locked-in to a specific provider. You can't send messages to your facebook friends from your freedom respecting gnu social server or whatever. You have to install a dozen apps (facebook, whatsapp, telegram, etc) to talk with all your friends.

Re: Bootstrapping Urbit from Ethereum

#124

Post by sillysaurus3 »

archagon wrote: post #106
sillysaurus3 wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've spent the last 15 minutes reading everything I can find about the subject, and honestly nothing seems very inflammatory. Have you read this? https://medium.com/@curtis.yarvin/why-you-should-come-to-lam... He seems like a reasonable, intelligent person, and people have gone out of their way to mischaracterize what he did say and to label him a racist. He was also writing under a pen name, and -- believe it or not…

Frankly, intelligence is not very high on my list of attributes I value in people. Plenty of terrible people are intelligent. And although I'm not deeply versed on the collective works of Yarvin/Moldbug, I know enough from osmosis, and also that, a) dark enlightenment type discussions that I've witnessed on Reddit et al. over the past few years — which have seemingly morphed into today's alt-right — are downright nau…

Listen to what I'm saying. If you want to exclude him, the very least you owe him is to paste an actual quote written by him as justification. Without that, this is straight-up libel.

Re: Bootstrapping Urbit from Ethereum

#125

Post by Karunamon »

jolux wrote: post #81
munin wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think urbit started out as a pomo critique of modern academia and tech, with heavy jargon and wheel rebuilding. Then, some other people started taking it seriously. I’m not sure if that is the best or worst outcome for this kind of joke.

Moldbug hates pomo though. Pretty sure the dude doesn't read anything that was written after the year 1900.

Sorry, Pomo? Can’t get a good definition via the googles.

Re: Bootstrapping Urbit from Ethereum

#126

Post by munin »

jolux wrote: post #81
munin wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think urbit started out as a pomo critique of modern academia and tech, with heavy jargon and wheel rebuilding. Then, some other people started taking it seriously. I’m not sure if that is the best or worst outcome for this kind of joke.

Moldbug hates pomo though. Pretty sure the dude doesn't read anything that was written after the year 1900.

Don't you know, the Moldbug persona is separate from the persona that develops Urbit!

Re: Bootstrapping Urbit from Ethereum

#128

Post by archagon »

sillysaurus3 wrote: post #124
archagon wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Frankly, intelligence is not very high on my list of attributes I value in people. Plenty of terrible people are intelligent. And although I'm not deeply versed on the collective works of Yarvin/Moldbug, I know enough from osmosis, and also that, a) dark enlightenment type discussions that I've witnessed on Reddit et al. over the past few years — which have seemingly morphed into today's alt-right — are downright nau…

Listen to what I'm saying. If you want to exclude him, the very least you owe him is to paste an actual quote written by him as justification. Without that, this is straight-up libel.

Libel? That’s laughable, given that the only thing I pointed to was Yarvin’s very clear intellectual ties to the dark enlightenment school of thought, further reinforced by his connections to people like Thiel and Bannon. I am not going to go spelunking for quotes just to win some karma on the internet. I have better things to do with my time. Obviously.

Re: Bootstrapping Urbit from Ethereum

#129

Post by sillysaurus3 »

21893120975 wrote: post #114
sillysaurus3 wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've spent the last 15 minutes reading everything I can find about the subject, and honestly nothing seems very inflammatory. Have you read this? https://medium.com/@curtis.yarvin/why-you-should-come-to-lam... He seems like a reasonable, intelligent person, and people have gone out of their way to mischaracterize what he did say and to label him a racist. He was also writing under a pen name, and -- believe it or not…

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA512 > One of the most persuasive things you could do in this situation would be to post a quote written by Chris. Posting a quote from Moldbug would be the second most persuasive thing. Failing either of those, are we supposed to just take your word for it that the dude should be excluded from society? > This whole "label and exclude" thing is for the birds. Why not judge i…

This is a great reply, and I felt myself being persuaded by it. Then I thought about it. Your criticism of his writings appears to boil down to "He's not taking a stance." Is that an accurate summary?

If so, then it's impossible to be ok with excluding him.

Re: Bootstrapping Urbit from Ethereum

#130

Post by jacobush »

occultist_throw wrote: post #43
han-sel wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"It is really just a Unix server and programming language." You should read https://urbit.org/posts/overview/ The whole reason Urbit exists is that Unix + the internet is broken and needs a complete overhaul Re: the different names, there are slight differences between gates and functions, but I agree they're not important enough to merit the change in name. But hey, it takes a purist to spend 15 years rewriting the…

Yep. Unix and Linux are broken. So instead, I should load up Urbit, locate on a planet, spin up a garglemitz on the spitzenspeil with the hoon japing over the nock. If you add Xenu, Body Thetans, e-meters, I think you might be on to something! -------------------- No seriously. There are wrong things with the monolothic kernel as well as microkernels. Theyre design tradeoffs. But none of the existing, well establishe…

Best comment so far - you put words on what disturbs me so much about Urbit. It takes the technobabble to a whole new level. I don't care if they succeed, I want no part of it.
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