APL – a Glimpse of Heaven (2006)
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APL – a Glimpse of Heaven (2006)
1–10 of 47 posts
Re: APL – a Glimpse of Heaven (2006)
#2The writing is kind of verbose.
Re: APL – a Glimpse of Heaven (2006)
#3"To believe that “plain language” programming would be more readable is Utopian, even intellectually dishonest. For if I say, “a linear function of a variable is equal to the sum of a constant and of the product of a variable and a second constant”, it is incontestably English but completely obscure, even incomprehensible!"
This is absolutely true. People try to make a big deal out of natural language for both programming and simply interacting with computers. Rarely would a natural language description be easier, clearer, or faster than a more precise interface (e.g. text for programming, mouse/keyboard for interacing with computers).
Re: APL – a Glimpse of Heaven (2006)
#4But only if you have the digital flexibility of a monkey.
That said, this is always worth watching as a demo of the language's power: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a9xAKttWgP4. I'm not afraid to admit that I wish my language could do that.
Re: APL – a Glimpse of Heaven (2006)
#5"To believe that “plain language” programming would be more readable is Utopian, even intellectually dishonest. For if I say, “a linear function of a variable is equal to the sum of a constant and of the product of a variable and a second constant”, it is incontestably English but completely obscure, even incomprehensible!" This is absolutely true. People try to make a big deal out of natural language for both progra…
If you are talking about math, sure. But then your average person would be unable to articulate much of that anyways, in English or otherwise, while professionals who are trained in this area are willing to invest in artificial languages to express it concisely.
If you are talking about automating every day tasks through "code," then natural language makes perfect sense; the future their is going to be based on increasingly sophisticated dialogue systems in forms like Siri, Now, Cortana.
Re: APL – a Glimpse of Heaven (2006)
#6"To believe that “plain language” programming would be more readable is Utopian, even intellectually dishonest. For if I say, “a linear function of a variable is equal to the sum of a constant and of the product of a variable and a second constant”, it is incontestably English but completely obscure, even incomprehensible!" This is absolutely true. People try to make a big deal out of natural language for both progra…
Depends on the context, no? Natural language works great when you accept that it is far from context free. Consider "how do I get to the nearest store?" Give me that in a programming language where it is functionally better than what a person can provide? Suddenly, you'll find that you have to start adding in all sorts of additional information that is just assumed otherwise.
And, it is not like this is unique to language. Even in math, one often finds a certain lack of precision that is accepted and more cumbersome to work with than without.
Or, mayhap I just misunderstand more than I understand. :) Very likely.
Edit: There is also the issue of a terrible example. If I were to explain a linear function to someone, I would say more that it is a function where the output changes in constant proportion to changes of the input.
Re: APL – a Glimpse of Heaven (2006)
#7But only if you have the digital flexibility of a monkey. That said, this is always worth watching as a demo of the language's power: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a9xAKttWgP4 . I'm not afraid to admit that I wish my language could do that.
This is one of my favourite coding videos and everyone should watch it. It's nice to see it again having read through a description of how APL works.
Re: APL – a Glimpse of Heaven (2006)
#8The writing is kind of verbose.
Hehe, that had me chuckle. I'm sorry you got downvoted, that must be by people that either did not go to the article or that don't have a clue what APL looks like in practice.
Re: APL – a Glimpse of Heaven (2006)
#9But only if you have the digital flexibility of a monkey. That said, this is always worth watching as a demo of the language's power: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a9xAKttWgP4 . I'm not afraid to admit that I wish my language could do that.
Oh, this is cool: http://tryapl.org
Re: APL – a Glimpse of Heaven (2006)
#10If you like APL or are in general interested in material like this then you should definitely check out the J language (which is sort of the successor to APL).
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