Before I retired in 1992, I often used the APL domino to solve simultaneous equations and (more often) to find best-fit approximations to measured data. My guess is that some people thought that you got more useful calculation from one symbol with the domino than with anything else. I'm sure the jewel depends on how you work and what you are working on, but domino comes close for me.
On 02/25/2012 06:32 PM, Dan Bron wrote: > Why would matrix inversion be the "jewel in the crown of APL"? > > -Dan > > > On Feb 25, 2012, at 5:58 PM, Ian Clark<earthspo...@gmail.com> wrote: > >> I'd say any publicity for practical uses of (;:) is good. Even if only >> because it's Alan Turing's 100th anniversary (celebrated this week by >> Nature http://www.nature.com/nature/current_issue.html) >> >> APL's "world-in-a-primitive" is Domino ⌹ (%.) --hailed as the jewel in >> its crown. I was once offered the tapes of the keystroke log of a >> sizeable IBM APL-coding shop for research. In about 5 years, Domino >> had been used precisely twice. On both occasions as the fill char in a >> histogram. >> >> I guess an APL counterpart of (;:) would have suffered the same fate. >> Not many people know how to program a Turing Machine nowadays. (But it >> has a great future in biocomputing.) >> >> On Sat, Feb 25, 2012 at 4:57 PM, David Ward Lambert >> <b49p23t...@stny.rr.com> wrote: >>>> From: Don Guinn<dongu...@gmail.com> >>>> Subject: [Jprogramming] Sequential Machine >>>> To: Programming forum<programming@jsoftware.com> >>>> Message-ID: >>>> <caecakcmyaatsiuxjrt+u4q5bexrqg6utsurksb57m3a_qaj...@mail.gmail.com> >>> I finally decided to "master" sequential machine. The report of my >>> experience is posted in the new vocabulary page >>> http://www.jsoftware.com/jwiki/Vocabulary/semico >>> >>> nuvoc >>> http://www.jsoftware.com/jwiki/ControlNuVoc >>> >>> As always, please enhance, rewrite, whatnot at your will. >>> Is a sequential machine tutorial useful at the >>> Jsoftware Conference - 23/24 July 2012 - Toronto ? >>> >>> >>> ---------------------------------------------------------------------- >>> 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
