Especially interesting would be including the style of Mathematica's lists. I cringe when I have to deal with lists in Mathematica; however, it has the very nice feature that a list can have any sort of elements whatsoever. Pictures, functions, etc.. It would be very interesting to see, for example, a J in which a list of functions could be applied to a list of arguments, and it could also get rid of boxing and fills (ie. output list objects instead of rows or boxes). It should also be noted that Mathematica does not have great function manipulation as far as I can tell, in that the syntax is arbitrary and just in general not tacit (I know, that is a bit of a cheap shot).
Marshall -----Original Message----- From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Bo Jacoby Sent: Monday, November 22, 2010 7:09 AM To: Programming forum Subject: Re: [Jprogramming] tacit programming The www.wolframalpha.com is such a formulator as requested by Neville Holmes below. I find it very impressive. I wonder when the symbolic power of Mathematica is united with the compact expressive power of J. --- Den man 22/11/10 skrev neville holmes <[email protected]>: > Fra: neville holmes <[email protected]> > Emne: Re: [Jprogramming] tacit programming > Til: [email protected] > Dato: mandag 22. november 2010 06.03 > I have been bemused by the discussion > of tacit coding. > Having some time ago been forced from APL to J and being utterly > delighted by the tacit style, I taught it at both undergraduate and > postgraduate levels. > See "Tacit J and I" in Vector Vol.23 No.3 > (www.vector.org.uk/archive/v233/tji.htm) which gave the background to > the series of tutorial essays I used for Honours classes in > "Functional Calculation" and which started appearing in that Vector > and are continuing, despite publicity to the contrary. > > My tack was that the tacit style is the purest imaginable (to me at > any rate) mode of functional expression and my experience was that the > students agreed and coped very well, though they always went back to > what they saw as the more expressive (I disagreed) coding styles as in > Basic (ouch!) and C (shrug!) for example. > > The core issue seems to be whether you are tackling a calculation or > facing up to a massive system. I held the opinion that tacit J was > basically calculation and that connecting to files and databases was > peripheral. > > However, there are problems in calculating with tacit J. > I recently put an essay in my Computer column describing a device I > called the formulator (see > eprints.utas.edu.au/9474) that was based om my experience teaching > tacit J (though that essay doesn't explicitly say so). > > What I proposed for the formulator would take the familiar calculator > and take it a level higher, from arithmetic to algebra. I have > another essay explaining the formulator in more detail for the APL/J > world and this awaits proofing and publication (but see > www.vector.org.uk/?vol=24&no=4&art=holmes (Stephen: > I trust > this isn't out of line; it seemed a good time to expose it to J > people)). > > My motive was to provide a simple tool for people learning and > teaching mathematics at school, and the striving for simplicity is the > reason for some deviations from, and subsetting of, APL/J. However, > adoption of the formulator would make transition to APL/J quite simple > for formulator users. > > Should anyone wish to produce a formulator I would be delighted to > cooperate, but I don't feel up to doing it myself alone). > > Neville Holmes, P.O. Box 2412, Bakery Hill 3354, Victoria > > > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > 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
