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Rapira (Рапира) – Soviet programming language interpreter

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Re: Rapira (Рапира) – Soviet programming language interpreter

#51

Post by rixed »

przemelek wrote: post #22
ahmedfromtunis wrote: post #15

I wish the Soviets had focused more on developing an independent computer industry and their own distinct flavors of programming languages. Imagine the thrill of studying languages built to run on completely separate hardware architectures, featuring entirely novel paradigms and structures. This would be the closest thing to experience reverse-engineering a computer from an alien spaceship.

But they simply weren't able to sustain it. In the West, while the military industry initially pushed computer development, private companies quickly adapted those technologies for the consumer market. Over time, the Western consumer market became vastly larger than the military one. In the USSR, this cross-pollination wasn't possible because anything that even touched the military was immediately classified as a sta…

Sounds simple. Would you also have a story to explain why Europe never managed to develop an independent IT industry either?

Re: Rapira (Рапира) – Soviet programming language interpreter

#52

Post by mamonster »

grishka wrote: post #30

By the way, there's one Cyrillic programming language still in wide use today. It's part of 1С (1S), an ERP system that's absolutely everywhere in Russia. The language itself is quite similar to Visual Basic. It's awkward to write with a regular Russian keyboard layout, but I was told that there exist special layouts just for it.

I had to deal with 1C once for a client who insisted on reconciling his (mid-9 figure) assets into it. The good part of it is that a competent 1C programmer (of which he had 2) can basically make it do anything, exactly like SAP, but the out of the box experience is terrible.

Re: Rapira (Рапира) – Soviet programming language interpreter

#53

Post by stasomatic »

przemelek wrote: post #39
lo_zamoyski wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Those born in countries like Poland One famous example is Jacek Karpiński [0]. Soviet pressure, opposition to the use of Western parts, and intense jealousy of the commie state bureaucracy which sought to hold a monopoly over computer production (e.g., through the state-owned companies Odra and Elwro) halted production. Here's some English language documentation for one of his models (the K-202) which was exported…

Exactly, and Jacek Karpiński is the perfect tragic example of this dynamic. It's worth noting that Poland was actually one of the least ideologically rigid countries in the Eastern Bloc. While you couldn't openly oppose the regime, it was entirely possible to have a brilliant career in science or medicine (like Zbigniew Religa, who pioneered Poland's heart transplantation program) without strictly toeing the Party li…

My first PC was an Atari 800XL smuggled in from Krakow stuffed somewhere in my dad’s Volga’s chassis, circa ‘87, with cassette player and I joystick. I played The Revenge of Montezuma until I could play it just by sound on the hell settings. We did have some minis in my uni in Odessa, they had Fortran but I think we just played Pong on them.

I really wanted an MSX looking box though, that we played Karateka on in some precursors of Internet cafes, they looked the business, like high end Japanese hifi gear of the era.

Re: Rapira (Рапира) – Soviet programming language interpreter

#54

Post by shrubble »

ahmedfromtunis wrote: post #15

I wish the Soviets had focused more on developing an independent computer industry and their own distinct flavors of programming languages. Imagine the thrill of studying languages built to run on completely separate hardware architectures, featuring entirely novel paradigms and structures. This would be the closest thing to experience reverse-engineering a computer from an alien spaceship.

Their semiconductor manufacturing was 10-15 years behind the Western technology. They just didn’t have the capability. Despite that they had good brains and delivered efficiently with what they had.

Re: Rapira (Рапира) – Soviet programming language interpreter

#55

Post by theamk »

ahmedfromtunis wrote: post #15

I wish the Soviets had focused more on developing an independent computer industry and their own distinct flavors of programming languages. Imagine the thrill of studying languages built to run on completely separate hardware architectures, featuring entirely novel paradigms and structures. This would be the closest thing to experience reverse-engineering a computer from an alien spaceship.

When I first learned about ternary machines like SETUN [0] I was so excited! Forger bits, there are "trits", and instead of boring boolean logic you have +/0/- trits. As alien as it gets!

But then I read much more about the design, and it turns out that the reason machine was ternary is the designers had to minimize number of transistors, and leaned heavily into transformer-based logic - which naturally favors ternary values.

But for transistor/IC circuitry, there are no advantages in ternary - they key to reliability is margins, and margins require only two states. Any transistor-based ternary implementation would be forced to using a pair of bits and declare one of the four states invalid - a clear efficiency loss.

History confirmed it - even in MSU, once transistors became more available, they abandoned SETUN and started using those. Turns out at least that ternary branch was just a evolutionary dead end.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Setun

Re: Rapira (Рапира) – Soviet programming language interpreter

#56

Post by homarp »

rixed wrote: post #51
przemelek wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But they simply weren't able to sustain it. In the West, while the military industry initially pushed computer development, private companies quickly adapted those technologies for the consumer market. Over time, the Western consumer market became vastly larger than the military one. In the USSR, this cross-pollination wasn't possible because anything that even touched the military was immediately classified as a sta…

Sounds simple. Would you also have a story to explain why Europe never managed to develop an independent IT industry either?

the 8bit era had a few 'european' computers. but not scaled enough to survive the PC era, I guess.

arm is one offshoot of that era.

Erlang and Prolog (and Ada I guess) are also european-ish.

why? too many localisation to be able to scale?

Re: Rapira (Рапира) – Soviet programming language interpreter

#57

Post by Insimwytim »

ajcp wrote: post #38
vbezhenar wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's a bit different. USSR just wasn't rich enough to afford experimentation and innovation. Resources (including human brain power) were quite limited. So they had to copy proven solutions. Simple as that. It's easy to judge them in the retrospective. But they had to make decisions, using the information the had at the moment, weighing risks as they saw them at that moment.

The comment you are replying to is correct. The Soviet Union had massive amounts of resources and capital (both human and economic) to be able to develop and support technical innovations. The wider-Soviet bloc itself was of such a scale as to be able to completely support their own divergent technologies and innovations. The higher education systems themselves were sufficient to provide and foster the talent, even i…

> overly-centralized nature of national resource and economic strategy and planning.

This is a common misconception. Supported by the Soviet Union government in the 80s.

The fact is, that the efforts to sabotage and disband central planning started as early as 1954.

In 1954 an executive order of 14 Oct 1954 reduced the amount of administrative personnel by 450 thousands.

The amount of metrics went down from 9 940 to 6 308 in 1954, to 3 081 in 1955, and to 1 780 in 1958.

Khrushchev moved most of the planning power from central planning institution to the regions and down to the factories and enterprises. What previously was strict targets from the center now became soft suggestions.

Imagine you are a CTO and your workforce is heavily reduces and the goals you set are considered to be a mere suggestions. Not a very efficient instrument indeed. But not because it is overly-centralized.

Re: Rapira (Рапира) – Soviet programming language interpreter

#58

Post by Insimwytim »

przemelek wrote: post #34
vbezhenar wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's a bit different. USSR just wasn't rich enough to afford experimentation and innovation. Resources (including human brain power) were quite limited. So they had to copy proven solutions. Simple as that. It's easy to judge them in the retrospective. But they had to make decisions, using the information the had at the moment, weighing risks as they saw them at that moment.

It wasn't a lack of raw brainpower or wealth; it was a structural and ideological failure of resource allocation. The USSR and the Iron Curtain bloc had a massive population and world-class scientific talent. The problem was that the Soviet system viewed independent thought and individuality as a threat, actively sabotaging its own geniuses: Persecution of Top Minds: Sergei Korolev, the literal architect of the Sovie…

> Sergei Korolev, the literal architect of the Soviet space program, was sent to the Gulag, where he lost his teeth to scurvy and survived a broken jaw

That's just a scary tale, that was created long after he died.

> Trofim Lysenko’s fraudulent agricultural theories were deemed "more communist."

Not exactly. His "fraudulent" theories delivered real value, and saved millions of people from starving. But he didn't belong to fancy scientific establishment (which traveled to conferences abroad while studying things with no impact to the people). He was a regular man, with experience working on land and with an aim for a practical results. He was not from "the club". So said establishment hated him and seized the first opportunity to attack him. Said establishment in all forms and shapes still hates him and other talented outsiders.

Discussion between Trofim Lysenko and his challengers actually public - you can read it yourself, not distorted conclusion-ready version presented by his haters.

I'm not saying you are wrong on all counts, but at least with those two examples you seem to just follow the usual narrative.

Re: Rapira (Рапира) – Soviet programming language interpreter

#59

Post by Mikhail_Edoshin »

layer8 wrote: post #50
grishka wrote: post #30

By the way, there's one Cyrillic programming language still in wide use today. It's part of 1С (1S), an ERP system that's absolutely everywhere in Russia. The language itself is quite similar to Visual Basic. It's awkward to write with a regular Russian keyboard layout, but I was told that there exist special layouts just for it.

I’m curious, why is it awkward to write with a regular Russian keyboard layout? Presumably due to punctuation and not due to the Cyrillic characters?

Some symbols may not be readily available, e. g. or {} or [] and you'll have to either switch to English or install and learn a modified layout. But this is mostly a Windows issue, I think; the Russian keyboard layout on Windows is barebones compared to that of Mac. As a result there are other custom-made layouts in circulation, e.g. a typographically enhanced one.

Re: Rapira (Рапира) – Soviet programming language interpreter

#60

Post by grishka »

Mikhail_Edoshin wrote: post #59
layer8 wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m curious, why is it awkward to write with a regular Russian keyboard layout? Presumably due to punctuation and not due to the Cyrillic characters?

Some symbols may not be readily available, e. g. or {} or [] and you'll have to either switch to English or install and learn a modified layout. But this is mostly a Windows issue, I think; the Russian keyboard layout on Windows is barebones compared to that of Mac. As a result there are other custom-made layouts in circulation, e.g. a typographically enhanced one.

I've been using Mac for ages but I use the layout Apple calls "Russian — PC". These characters are still not really that available. There are some alt-shift-whatever contortions you can do to type them, but it's easier just to switch to English and back again. Apple's default Russian layout is even worse at the very least because the period is shift+7 instead of the key between Ю and shift.
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