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Λ-2D: An Exploration of Drawing as Programming Language

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Re: Λ-2D: An Exploration of Drawing as Programming Language

#32

Post by jasfi »

mattlondon wrote: post #25

Something that always struck me about this sort of thing, or in similar games, is that it is only 2D and so rapidly becomes incredibly crowded with lines going everywhere. We code in a 2D nature (rows and columns) but the flow is non-euclidean I guess

There's not enough space to represent code graphically, anything significant becomes crowded and messy.

Every project like this starts off extolling that we are visual creatures, but this is a type of visualization we're not well suited to.

Re: Λ-2D: An Exploration of Drawing as Programming Language

#33

Post by fluorinerocket »

tgv wrote: post #27

These things have been done in Labview, and it's hard to get anywhere. It's also been done in sound/music generation programs, with Max [max] as a (the?) granddaddy. While you can get things done, it quickly becomes messy too. Does it look good? I don't think so. [max] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_(software)

It takes a different mindset but clean and legible LabVIEW code can be written. There was a small community of professional LabVIEW developers who generally write very legible and good code. Different from what most people are used to but good. I left that world years ago because the writing was on the wall, LabVIEW was going to die no matter what you could do with it.

Re: Λ-2D: An Exploration of Drawing as Programming Language

#35

Post by redhed »

fluorinerocket wrote: post #33
tgv wrote: post #27

These things have been done in Labview, and it's hard to get anywhere. It's also been done in sound/music generation programs, with Max [max] as a (the?) granddaddy. While you can get things done, it quickly becomes messy too. Does it look good? I don't think so. [max] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_(software)

It takes a different mindset but clean and legible LabVIEW code can be written. There was a small community of professional LabVIEW developers who generally write very legible and good code. Different from what most people are used to but good. I left that world years ago because the writing was on the wall, LabVIEW was going to die no matter what you could do with it.

LabVIEW is still used a lot in Aerospace. Definitely due for a replacement at some point.

Re: Λ-2D: An Exploration of Drawing as Programming Language

#38

Post by crispyambulance »

fluorinerocket wrote: post #33
tgv wrote: post #27

These things have been done in Labview, and it's hard to get anywhere. It's also been done in sound/music generation programs, with Max [max] as a (the?) granddaddy. While you can get things done, it quickly becomes messy too. Does it look good? I don't think so. [max] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_(software)

It takes a different mindset but clean and legible LabVIEW code can be written. There was a small community of professional LabVIEW developers who generally write very legible and good code. Different from what most people are used to but good. I left that world years ago because the writing was on the wall, LabVIEW was going to die no matter what you could do with it.

I spent a lot of time in LabVIEW as well. I stopped with it way back when Active-X was thing and I got sick of always having to interface LabVIEW with Active-X controls.

LabVIEW is great for certain things, I think it has potential for others, but it's just too limited for general purpose computing.

Perhaps more important than anything is the fact that you can't just download it and use it like almost anything else these days. I don't think that has changed. It's not cheap either and they've switched to a subscription model.

Re: Λ-2D: An Exploration of Drawing as Programming Language

#39

Post by mikewarot »

Ugh.... similar to BitGrid[1] (my own hobby horse), but not. I imagine bits marching in parallel across a grid in the ultimate simplification of an FPGA. It's an idea that either has supreme utility (Petaflops for the masses), or doesn't... it's all down to how much energy a DFF takes on an ASIC. (This is a pair of numbers I've been trying to find forever... static power, and energy to load a bit)

Oh... and the programming model, nobody likes plopping logic down on a grid, they try to abstract it away as fast as possible. I don't have sufficient focus to be able to do that bit.

[edit] Somewhere in exploring this, I came across Von Neumann cellular automaton[2] and Nobili cellular automata[3], which I've not encountered, despite being interested similar ideas for decades. It's frustrating just how little discoverability there is in this portion of computer science.

Of course both share the same insane foundation:

  The set of FSAs define a cell space of infinite size. All FSAs are identical in terms of state-transition function, or rule-set.
It's that one "simplification" that relegates them to the domain of code golf.

[1] https://github.com/mikewarot/Bitgrid

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Von_Neumann_cellular_automaton

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nobili_cellular_automata

pps: If anyone wants to run with the idea of a BitGrid, I'd appreciate it

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