Breck Yunits 2021-03-02 04:08:21 Andreas S. 2021-03-03 10:03:31 so Interesting to see these different generations and maybe even types of personas
Andreas S. 2021-03-03 10:13:10 When the usual institutions fail (science grants) . Software does not exist in a vacuum. If programmers want to work on software there needs to be a relation, a need for it in society. Patreon crowdfunding is a good starting step showing that people care about such projects as andys and IMHO even dame langs.
Srini Kadamati 2021-03-03 13:43:06 I would say that Andy and Martin both had nontrivial followings on social media, which helped
Srini Kadamati 2021-03-03 13:43:28 building a sustainable patreon base is probably 75% linked to existing popularity you have 🤔
Andreas S. 2021-03-03 13:47:32 maybe its just me wishing that we could see a usable open Source implementation of the STEPS codebase (include working Nile/Gezira)....
Andreas S. 2021-03-03 13:48:10 I think the interaction with real project initiatives is important . small maker spaces peopple actually using the software in their need withtheir community
Srini Kadamati 2021-03-03 14:02:05 he wants to teach, research, synthesize, share, and do them all at the same time. That keeps him grounded / working on real problems
Jared Windover 2021-03-02 18:45:01
If I make an app, I have control and the user can only do what I decide is possible. If I make a document, the user can do as they please, changing it to their own needs@Xavier posted this https://futureofcoding.slack.com/archives/C5U3SEW6A/p1614710311085000?thread_ts=1614709272.084400&cid=C5U3SEW6A. I think that's a really interesting distinction that highlights a tension in software development. Sometimes as a developer or as a user I want there to be guardrails. Does anybody have thoughts about whether there's a middleground between documents and apps? Can you have the best of both worlds?
I'm picturing a system where it's fundamentally, or foundationally a document, but the user has opted in to a set of restrictions that make it into an app. Sort of like Enable/Disable js for the web , but more granular and a richer ontology.
[March 2nd, 2021 10:38 AM] xlambein: If I make an app, I have control and the user can only do what I decide is possible. If I make a document, the user can do as they please, adapting it to their own needs
Andrew F 2021-03-02 19:14:10 Types and schemas are guardrails. One of the use cases I think about is letting a TODO text file scale smoothly into an issue/work tracking system. Somewhere along the way, it's a list or set where all the entries/lines have to be a certain format. Then for modifying the list, you slowly graduate from direct manipulation to defined mutation operations. The entries themselves can graduate to records whenever you feel like it.
Further down the stack, strict types (especially e.g. session types) and frameworks can enforce strict usage patterns on their users, more like your "apps", whereas less strict libraries are closer to your "documents".
Chris Knott 2021-03-02 19:26:54 There's a fundamental tension in how much power you give to the immediate user as compared to future users.
The document distinction is not universal. One of the reasons PDF is popular is because most people don't have PDF editors installed, so the format suggests a sense of finality and care that .docx doesn't provide. If PDF editors were common, and .docx viewers were common, the formats would probably reverse in how they are used in society.
A similar thing exists in programming for stuff like marking classes as final in Java. This feature is just a straight political decision to favour the initial class writer over future users.
Andrew F 2021-03-02 22:29:59 PDFs are also an excellent example in how much interactivity they support. Besides my friend making self-filling mad-libs in PDF, when I worked in government almost the entire process of applying for/modifying a transit subsidy was managed through a single PDF. It would walk you through several screens of forms and then (IIRC) offer to email itself to the relevant office. I was and remain equal parts amazed and horrified.
Denny Vrandečić 2021-03-02 22:45:25 I always found a wiki an interesting tool in this spectrum of app to document. I made this a topic of a keynote I gave last year - wikis, particularly Semantic MediaWiki as a pay-as-you-go Application Development system. Talk is here, starts around Minute 14 on this topic, but might need context from before: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EosGUoucthg
Andreas S. 2021-03-03 10:02:54 Thank you for sharing this Denny. As a long time follower of the "wiki" project I interested how things evolve.
Konrad Hinsen 2021-03-03 13:14:52 Nice talk! Are there simple examples/demos of applications built on Semantic MediaWiki? Or some kind of tutorial?
Konrad Hinsen 2021-03-03 13:30:35 I also liked your discussion of the marketability of products. This is very true for well-established technology as well. Nobody markets paper, it's something that's just there, a commodity that everybody knows about. I am not an expert on the history of paper, but I suspect that nobody ever did a mass marketing compaign for it. It probably started with a small producer and consumer base, which then grew by word of mouth. But then, that's fine. Software tools good go the same way, and arguably some do. I haven't seen much marketing for org-mode, for example.
Andreas S. 2021-03-03 14:07:40 Very interesting @Denny Vrandečić when you mentioned Semantic Media Wiki as a Rapid Application Platform. To me it feels connected to my Zettelkasten efforts. All the tools showing up recently like RoamResearch, Athens , Zettlr etc .. going in a very similar direction.
Andreas S. 2021-03-03 14:09:32 The Author of Roam and Unison language sometimes discuss approaches like Gtoolkit (smalltalk images) in this context. Looking back it seems like a missed opportunity that thankfully still did reach mainstream , even though through other tools (not primarily related to mediawiki)
Denny Vrandečić 2021-03-03 18:05:00 Andreas S yes, I agree - all these tools have something in common, and it's hard to really pinpoint what it is. And that's what makes it so hard to capture their strength. I have to look into gtoolkit!
bmitc 2021-03-04 23:57:39 bmitc 2021-03-07 00:37:26 I came across this paper/dissertation: Text in Diagrams: Challenges to and Opportunities of Automatic Layout, which perhaps deserves its own post at some point. It's by Christoph Daniel Schulze, who, at least at one point, seemed to be involved in the Eclipse graph data structure I posted.
https://d-nb.info/120297998X/34
Jack Rusher 2021-03-05 10:20:15 Weird question, but humor me: what are your favorite JS libraries that are available as ES6 modules?
Mariano Guerra 2021-03-05 12:57:03 the only one I consume as es module right now since it's officially supported is date-fns
Mariano Guerra 2021-03-05 12:57:19 but I would love to use all others like that to get some extra tree shaking
Jack Rusher 2021-03-05 13:31:55 I've just rigged up some voodoo to import ES6 modules into a running JVM in Clojure, so I can do what you see in the attached image. Just thinking about which libraries might be interesting to run this way...
Emmanuel Oga 2021-03-07 01:53:04 I have a super stupid question (hard to google) that doesn't necessarily have to to with FoC but I'll risk it 🙂. I was wondering if there are any lenses or materials that can shift light hues. Intuitively, I think the answer is no, at least not "passively", since that would imply somehow changing the frequencies of the light waves, but I'm not sure. Say those red/blue "3d lenses" only filter the light allowing the red or blue wavelengths to get through, if I get it right. But light is weird and maybe there's something I'm missing, heh
This brings me to the meta subject, since FoC has a strict to semi-strict set of rules and I see some zeal in keeping things tidy (which is a good thing 👍), I was wondering if we could benefit from a #random channel, with a bit more relaxed set of rules 🙂
Doug Moen 2021-03-07 02:43:09 Try googling "optical frequency shifter". It's outside my domain, but it looks relevant.
Emmanuel Oga 2021-03-07 03:18:50 oh cool, so it is some sort of active device, which makes sense. Also found some info about doppler effect applied to light. So maybe one way would be to strap an LCD panel to a rocket. Not very practical 😛
Konrad Hinsen 2021-03-07 11:10:50 Probably not what you have in mind as a piece of technology, but https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fluorescence can emit wavelengths different from incoming light. Usually the shift is to higher wavelengths, but there are cases where two photons are absorbed, followed by emission of a single one of shorter wavelength.
Ivan Reese 2021-03-07 18:29:53 Tangent: You (all) may be interested in the video game https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Slower_Speed_of_Light, and the related discussion. The game gives you an interactive way to explore the question, "What would it look like if the speed of light were slowed down to a walking pace?" In the game, you need to collect a bunch of tokens (like coins in Mario). Each time you collect a token, the speed of light is slowed down. This slower speed of light leads to all sorts of changes in perception, including changes in color. It's worth playing to experience firsthand, and then reading more about.
Meta-tangent: #present-company is the de facto random channel. I'll add a note about that to the https://futureofcoding.org/member-handbook.
