Syntax looks very javascripty. It seems the big innovations are the stigmergy concept for triggering a new behaviour and the method of knowing who is and isn't in the swarm.
--- Original Message --- From: "Raul Miller" <[email protected]> Sent: July 30, 2015 10:23 PM To: "Chat forum" <[email protected]> Subject: Re: [Jchat] Swarm programming "it wouldn't be a natural fit" for the current implementation. But note that we have partial implementations of the language included as facets of the language. For example: some primitives which work on dense arrays do not work on sparse arrays. For example: 13 : falls back to 3 : or 4 : for some expressions. We also have various projects within the community which grow and/or languish in various ways depending on unpredictable influences. First thing, though, for anything swarm-like, would be for the people implementing the support to have some practical access to things that could be swarms and also the patience to work through the holes and flaws in the underlying systems. Thanks, -- Raul On Thu, Jul 30, 2015 at 9:12 AM, Dan Bron <[email protected]> wrote: > Wolfram is/was a big advocate of cellular automata - he even proposed them as > a new fundamental unit of study in NKS. > > Given that, I have to imagine the revamped Mathematica, now called Wolfram > Language, has built-in support for CAs and swarm programming. > > I think the APLs, J included, are kind of the antithesis of swarm > programming. J is the canonical top-down kind of language, whereas swarm > behavior manifests bottom-up. A bunch of independent agents each following > their own rules, giving rise to higher level, emergent behaviors of the > crowd/swarm as a whole. > > It could be modeled in J, of course (anything can), but I’d argue it wouldn’t > be a natural fit. > > -Dan > >> On Jul 30, 2015, at 8:39 AM, R.E. Boss <[email protected]> wrote: >> >> The other day I noticed a quote in the lab J By Point & Click: "Ken Iverson >> put it this way: In J, when you want to move the army from Philadelphia to >> New York, you say just that: move the army from Philadelphia to New York. >> In a scalar language, you say, Go to every soldier, and move that soldier to >> New York." which I remembered when I read >> http://www.technologyreview.com/view/539761/a-programming-language-for-robot >> -swarms/ . >> Especially where it says "The opposing method is a top down approach in >> which the swarm is controlled as a whole." and "(...)the absence of a >> standardised programming language for swarms is a significant barrier to >> future progress (...) " >> >> Hear, hear. >> >> >> R.E. Boss >> >> >> >> ---------------------------------------------------------------------- >> For information about J forums see http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > For information about J forums see http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For information about J forums see http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For information about J forums see http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm
