In Praise of Scripting: Real Programming Pragmatism

[reposted from J programming]



I have just got the July issue of Computer (computer.org/computer)
and was startled to read an article "In Praise of Scripting" which
entirely ignored APL/J while praising the benefits of its style
as seen in various other coding schemes.

[See http://www.cse.wustl.edu/~loui/praiseieee.txt for a text version}

This seems to me to be a good opportunity for getting the
APL/J world some long overdue attention, either by a letter
to the editor or (much better) through a formal article
following on from the above giving some APL history, some
description of APL/J features comparing them to those praised
in the above, and some examples of serious use of APL/J.

Curiously, I exchanged some emails with Guido van Rossum,
the Belgian originator of Python (which was praised in the
Computer article), quite a few years ago now, and got him
eventually to agree that there was a lot of similarity
between J and Python, though he insisted that he hadn't
known about APL or J when he was developing Python.

I don't feel competent (being thoroughly retired and out-of-date)
or appropriate (being on the editorial board of Computer and
being notorious for bringing APL/J up in conversations there)
to do this, but I would be happy to help and advise as necessary
anybody volunteering to do this. A quick effort could maybe
get published before the end of the year if it is gone about
in the right way.

Neville Holmes, P.O. Box 2412, Bakery Hill 3354, Victoria
holmeswn@yahoo.com.au

"Stephen Taylor <editor@vector.org.uk>"
<StephenTaylorFRSA@googlemail.com> wrote in message
news:7c97e586-99b4-427e-9479-72f4bcfd1846@t54g2000hsg.googlegroups.com...
> [reposted from J programming]
>
>
>
> I have just got the July issue of Computer (computer.org/computer)
> and was startled to read an article "In Praise of Scripting" which
> entirely ignored APL/J while praising the benefits of its style
> as seen in various other coding schemes.
>
> [See http://www.cse.wustl.edu/~loui/praiseieee.txt for a text version}
>
> This seems to me to be a good opportunity for getting the
> APL/J world some long overdue attention, either by a letter
> to the editor or (much better) through a formal article
> following on from the above giving some APL history, some
> description of APL/J features comparing them to those praised
> in the above, and some examples of serious use of APL/J.
>
> Curiously, I exchanged some emails with Guido van Rossum,
> the Belgian originator of Python (which was praised in the
> Computer article), quite a few years ago now, and got him
> eventually to agree that there was a lot of similarity
> between J and Python, though he insisted that he hadn't
> known about APL or J when he was developing Python.
>
> I don't feel competent (being thoroughly retired and out-of-date)
> or appropriate (being on the editorial board of Computer and
> being notorious for bringing APL/J up in conversations there)
> to do this, but I would be happy to help and advise as necessary
> anybody volunteering to do this. A quick effort could maybe
> get published before the end of the year if it is gone about
> in the right way.
>
> Neville Holmes, P.O. Box 2412, Bakery Hill 3354, Victoria
> holmeswn@yahoo.com.au
>

(Because of respect to the entire content I didn't touch the previous
mail)

Being "thoroughly retired and out-of-date" (so am I) doesn't seem to me
as a valid excuse, with all respect. There are ways to bring the
APL-like languages under public attention without having
thorough/working knowledge (proof: see everday's newspapers, weeklies,
monthlies - it's all done by journalists who have only slight knowledge
of any material). E.g. when applying for a job by way of a letter,
getting an invitation for an interview, the letter has done it's job!
Ten years ago I've submitted two articles on K, which were both accepted
in a weekly, freely distributed to every IT-er in the Neth. One year
later Kx Systems organized a seminar in Amsterdam, which "created stir"
http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/st...999/0000984678

The "quality" of the audience was high, very high, but I really don't
know about the follow up, which is not really of my concern. The point
is: the articles plus the seminar did their job very well. They
attracted the appropriate segment of the market: banks, insurance
companies, telecom, unions ATL - mass transaction businesses.
Now I have a new article on Q underway to the same magazine. I
"compiled" it from my own scarce knowledge in the first place and
further I grabbed from Kx-newsletters and particularly from Jeff
Borror's article (a sort of translation, for which I got explicitely
permission).
(As soon as it is in the air I'll provide the link here).

My point is: you may compile such a contribution as well, I'm sure you
can do it and I hope you're going to do it! Good luck!

^\jk

On Jul 28, 10:00*am, "jk" <aq...@planet.nl (remove the q's)> wrote:
> "Stephen Taylor <edi...@vector.org.uk>"<StephenTaylorF...@googlema il.com>wrote in message
>
> news:7c97e586-99b4-427e-9479-72f4bcfd1846@t54g2000hsg.googlegroups.com...
>
>
>
> > [reposted from J programming]
>
> > I have just got the July issue of Computer (computer.org/computer)
> > and was startled to read an article "In Praise of Scripting" which
> > entirely ignored APL/J while praising the benefits of its style
> > as seen in various other coding schemes.
>
> > [Seehttp://www.cse.wustl.edu/~loui/praiseieee.txtfor a text version}
>
> > This seems to me to be a good opportunity for getting the
> > APL/J world some long overdue attention, either by a letter
> > to the editor or (much better) through a formal article
> > following on from the above giving some APL history, some
> > description of APL/J features comparing them to those praised
> > in the above, and some examples of serious use of APL/J.
>
> > Curiously, I exchanged some emails with Guido van Rossum,
> > the Belgian originator of Python (which was praised in the
> > Computer article), quite a few years ago now, and got him
> > eventually to agree that there was a lot of similarity
> > between J and Python, though he insisted that he hadn't
> > known about APL or J when he was developing Python.
>
> > I don't feel competent (being thoroughly retired and out-of-date)
> > or appropriate (being on the editorial board of Computer and
> > being notorious for bringing APL/J up in conversations there)
> > to do this, but I would be happy to help and advise as necessary
> > anybody volunteering to do this. *A quick effort could maybe
> > get published before the end of the year if it is gone about
> > in the right way.
>
> > Neville Holmes, P.O. Box 2412, Bakery Hill 3354, Victoria
> > holme...@yahoo.com.au
>
> (Because of respect to the entire content I didn't touch the previous
> mail)
>
> Being "thoroughly retired and out-of-date" (so am I) doesn't seem to me
> as a valid excuse, with all respect. There are ways to bring the
> APL-like languages under public attention without having
> thorough/working knowledge (proof: see everday's newspapers, weeklies,
> monthlies - it's all done by journalists who have only slight knowledge
> of any material). E.g. when applying for a job by way of a letter,
> getting an invitation for an interview, the letter has done it's job!
> Ten years ago I've submitted two articles on K, which were both accepted
> in a weekly, freely distributed to every IT-er in the Neth. One year
> later Kx Systems organized a seminar in Amsterdam, which "created stir"http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/stories.pl?ACCT=105&STORY=/www/stor...
>
> The "quality" of the audience was high, very high, but I really don't
> know about the follow up, which is not really of my concern. The point
> is: the articles plus the seminar did their job very well. They
> attracted the appropriate segment of the market: banks, insurance
> companies, telecom, unions ATL - mass transaction businesses.
> Now I have a new article on Q underway to the same magazine. I
> "compiled" it from my own scarce knowledge in the first place and
> further I grabbed from Kx-newsletters and particularly from Jeff
> Borror's article (a sort of translation, for which I got explicitely
> permission).
> (As soon as it is in the air I'll provide the link here).
>
> My point is: you may compile such a contribution as well, I'm sure you
> can do it and I hope you're going to do it! Good luck!
>
> ^\jk

Ronald Loui (author of the article "In Praise of Scripting") writes:

Rest assured that I know all about APL. You can't praise everything,
of course, and you can't attack everything. The article already
painted a very broad brush and never mentioned obviously related
things like SOA and AJAX... APL actually appears in the author's head
when I said "not too terse", but that's not what you wanted to hear.
I would say that APL is an excellent and interesting point in language
design. But I am not sure I would pay my programmers to work in that
language for most things. But perhaps I am ignorant. In any case,
it's good to see discussion. You should see how the LISP people
thought I slighted them. My real target, of course, was Java, and
they solved their problem just about the time that essay was submitted
by embracing scripting languages compiled to their JVM.

"Stephen Taylor <editor@vector.org.uk>"
<StephenTaylorFRSA@googlemail.com> wrote in message
news:f7eb8405-76c7-4189-91b6-0d87fda6b486@l64g2000hse.googlegroups.com...
On Jul 28, 10:00 am, "jk" <aq...@planet.nl (remove the q's)> wrote:
> "Stephen Taylor
> <edi...@vector.org.uk>"<StephenTaylorF...@googlema il.com> wrote in
> message
>
> news:7c97e586-99b4-427e-9479-72f4bcfd1846@t54g2000hsg.googlegroups.com...
>
[...]
> when I said "not too terse", but that's not what you wanted to hear.
> I would say that APL is an excellent and interesting point in language
> design. But I am not sure I would pay my programmers to work in that
> language for most things.
[...]

I would. Rather pay 3 APL-ers than an IT dept. of 30. Why are there 30
of 'em? Because they can't keep up with the pace of the real world -
they're holding up business. And the more the worse. Everybody can pick
ten examples from real life in a minute where people should complain.
Banks, insurances, shops, medicare, medical laboratories, civil
administration, tax administration, passports, drivers licenses, police,
travel, &c. &c. It can all be done faster, with more relevant and
coherent information (not the loads of junk we're getting everyday,
everyday). But they eat it as the weather IT is dictating.
I've heard c.e.o.'s complaining that IT had brought them no profit -
only expenses. IT is living it's own life, IT is a millstone for most
businesses, formalistic Molochs - they are holding up ...
APL/K/J is lean & fast, making the machine thinking like you do,
not the other way around.
^/jk