I think Dan has it right. A gerund is an atomic representation of a
verb. Could be a scalar (I use them that way a lot).
Henry Rich
On 2/18/2012 1:10 PM, Dan Bron wrote:
> I'm not sure gerunds are defined anywhere.
>
> But if they were, the phrasing might be "arrays of atomic representations",
> where the "atomic representation" characteristic is the most salient, and
> "array" has the normal meaning (and perhaps the usual question of whether a
> scalar is an array?).
>
> We often (informally) think of gerunds as vectors, because we compose them
> with ` whose product is defined to be vector, and consume them with e.g. @.
> whose (left input) is most useful when vector. But that's no reason to
> define gerunds as vectors, any more than to define selections as vectors,
> because we compose them with , , and consume them with e.g. { whose (left
> input) is frequently vector. Or saying 'string' is a string but 's' is not.
>
> Of course, in some contexts, 's' is not considered a string. So perhaps you
> are suggesting that "gerunds are are arrays of atomic representations, where
> the shape of the array has meaning"? If so, this is an interesting
> digression, which I'm happy to discuss, but perhaps we should move it to a
> different thread.
>
> The original question was not concerned with gerunds, and I doubt having the
> atomic representation of f@g (vector or scalar) in the corner of the result
> table would be satisfying. What was wanted was the string representation
> (which is produced using 5!:5, which operates on scalars, so shape doesn't
> have meaning to it, and neither does atomic representation).
>
> Anyway, when present the promise of J to newcomers, we need to take care not
> obscure the pitfalls. The literal Jenie (dJinni?) who delivers exactly what
> was asked for is rarely the hero of folklore.
>
> -Dan
>
> PS: If we wish to continue the digression, it might be better to start with
> the links below, better starting point would be wh
>
> Here's a couple places where I've attempted to capture the meaning of
> "gerund"
>
> Sidebar in NuVoc definition of ` :
> http://jsoftware.com/jwiki/Vocabulary/backtick#sidebar.3Agerunds
>
> As a necessary premise in the definition of a modifier utility:
> www.jsoftware.com/jwiki/DanBron/Snippets/DOOG#definition
>
> Please excuse typos; composed on a handheld device.
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Raul Miller<[email protected]>
> Sender: [email protected]
> Date: Sat, 18 Feb 2012 11:52:13
> To: Programming forum<[email protected]>
> Reply-To: Programming forum<[email protected]>
> Subject: Re: [Jprogramming] Verb display in function tables
>
> Ok...
>
> ...except that gerunds are defined as vectors.
>
> Conceptually speaking, if it's a scalar, or a matrix, it's something
> different. It would still be gerund-like, in character (we can
> trivially extract gerunds from it), but if we try using such things
> with primitives that handle gerunds, we are getting into undocumented
> territory.
>
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