April meeting next Thursday (26th)

[Phil Tomson]

Anyone got any presentations?

And if so, should we try to get the Tek room again?

Phil

[Richard Fobes]

On Apr 19, 11:01 pm, Phil Tomson <philtom...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Anyone got any presentations?

Nothing from me (that I'm prepared to present).

[Matt Youell]

I wasn't particularly interested in Opa, but I did like the idea of trying a hacking session. We've never done that with this group.

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[Phil Tomson]

Anything in particular you'd like to hack on?

Phil

[Matt Youell]

On 4/20/12 1:18 PM, Phil Tomson wrote:
> Anything in particular you'd like to hack on?
>
>

I had an idea. Not hacking exactly, more like collaborative design.

There is a middle ground between Python and Ruby, where a single hybrid
language could live.

We should design it. Just for fun.

While I have in mind a Python/Ruby hybrid, we can still incorporate
features of other languages if they are deemed to fit. We are a polyglot
group after all.

--
-/matt/-
http://youell.com/matt

[Richard Fobes]

I like Matt's idea of collaboratively designing a new language, just
to see what happens.

Based on my experience in the field of creative problem solving,
specifying a particular destination -- namely something that is
between Python and Ruby -- is not as powerful as starting with an
understandable general goal. Specifically the results would be quite
different depending on whether the goal is to solve a numerical-
modeling simulation, or creating a web application, or processing data
from a database, or doing some kind of translation, or achieving some
other specific purpose. If there is no specific goal, then the
conversation is likely to evolve into listing advantages and
disadvantages of specific languages, although even that would be
enjoyable (although not as fun).

(BTW, Phil and I discussed Opa before Matt arrived last month, and I
enjoyed that discussion.)

Richard

[Matt Youell]

On 4/21/12 10:49 AM, Richard Fobes wrote:
> I like Matt's idea of collaboratively designing a new language, just
> to see what happens.
>
> Based on my experience in the field of creative problem solving,
> specifying a particular destination -- namely something that is
> between Python and Ruby -- is not as powerful as starting with an
> understandable general goal. Specifically the results would be quite
> different depending on whether the goal is to solve a numerical-
> modeling simulation, or creating a web application, or processing data
> from a database, or doing some kind of translation, or achieving some
> other specific purpose. If there is no specific goal, then the
> conversation is likely to evolve into listing advantages and
> disadvantages of specific languages, although even that would be
> enjoyable (although not as fun).

I'm sure that if we focused on one particular domain we'd come up with
something skewed toward that domain. Which could be appropriate if we
were solving a problem. I liked the open-ended nature of what I was
proposing specifically because there is room to just explore for no
reason whatsoever. But, I gather from the silence from others that the
Python/Ruby/Whatever hybrid wasn't terribly interesting.

Whatever we end up doing, it would be fun to just explore for
exploration's sake. If we need a problem to solve to do that, so be it.
There are a bunch of technologies popping up all over the place that we
could chose to play with.

Hell, we could play Hacker News Roulette and just pick a story from HN
and play with whatever technology is described there. Or LtU, etc..

--
-/matt/-
http://youell.com/matt

[Phil Tomson]

On Sun, Apr 22, 2012 at 8:31 PM, Matt Youell <ma...@youell.com> wrote:
> On 4/21/12 10:49 AM, Richard Fobes wrote:
>>
>> I like Matt's idea of collaboratively designing a new language, just
>> to see what happens.
>>
>> Based on my experience in the field of creative problem solving,
>> specifying a particular destination -- namely something that is
>> between Python and Ruby -- is not as powerful as starting with an
>> understandable general goal.  Specifically the results would be quite
>> different depending on whether the goal is to solve a numerical-
>> modeling simulation, or creating a web application, or processing data
>> from a database, or doing some kind of translation, or achieving some
>> other specific purpose.  If there is no specific goal, then the
>> conversation is likely to evolve into listing advantages and
>> disadvantages of specific languages, although even that would be
>> enjoyable (although not as fun).
>
>
> I'm sure that if we focused on one particular domain we'd come up with
> something skewed toward that domain. Which could be appropriate if we were
> solving a problem. I liked the open-ended nature of what I was proposing
> specifically because there is room to just explore for no reason whatsoever.
> But, I gather from the silence from others that the Python/Ruby/Whatever
> hybrid wasn't terribly interesting.

Yeah, I gotta admit, the idea of a Ruby/Python/Whatever hybrid doesn't
sound all that exciting... What problem would that be trying to
solve? (or cause ;-)

I kind'a like the idea of starting with a problem or domain and then
designing a language to fit in that space. Now I can't find the
article, but I read something a few days back about a guy who designed
a specialized language for generating graphics.

>
> Whatever we end up doing, it would be fun to just explore for exploration's
> sake. If we need a problem to solve to do that, so be it. There are a bunch
> of technologies popping up all over the place that we could chose to play
> with.

Yeah, definitely up for some exploration.

Phil

>
> Hell, we could play Hacker News Roulette and just pick a story from HN and
> play with whatever technology is described there. Or LtU, etc..
>
>
>
> --
> -/matt/-
> http://youell.com/matt
>
>
>

[Ian Dees]

I've put in an application for the conference room. I'll let you know
as soon as I hear back.

When I invite engineers here to attend, what shall I say the meeting
is about? I think it'd be good if we could say we're talking briefly
about the Opa web programming language, then having an open discussion
and hackfest on programming language design.

--Ian

[Ian Dees]

Yarrr, there's other corporate stuff going on in the building too, and
we won't be able to get the room this week. :-(

Sorry, folks.

--Ian

[Richard Fobes]

On Apr 22, 10:13 pm, Phil Tomson <philtom...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Yeah, I gotta admit, the idea of a Ruby/Python/Whatever hybrid doesn't
> sound all that exciting...  What problem would that be trying to
> solve? (or cause ;-)
>
> I kind'a like the idea of starting with a problem or domain and then
> designing a language to fit in that space.  Now I can't find the
> article, but I read something a few days back about a guy who designed
> a specialized language for generating graphics.
>

> Yeah, definitely up for some exploration.

Generating graphics intrigues me. It got me to playing with the idea
of using VoteFair ranking to figure out the best linear sequence for a
directed graph (I think that's the right term), and that seems to work
nicely, but I got stuck trying to figure out how best to stretch that
linear sequence in a second dimension to better use the 2D space.
Admittedly this is like reverse engineering what's already been done
in GraphViz, but it's fun.

As for something more practical, we could tinker with the idea of
converting a "make" file (or similar text-based dependency data) into
a graphical representation. Just an idea, not a request.

I too am up for some exploration.

Richard

[Matt Youell]

Speaking of graphviz, I saw a project the other day that spits out a csv that details the fully qualified method names, lines of code, and one or two other metrics for a given codebase. I was thinking about pumping that boring CSV into Graphviz to see if it would be more interesting. Any interest?

Also where the heck are we meeting?

[Phil Tomson]

On Tue, Apr 24, 2012 at 12:55 PM, Matt Youell <ma...@newmoniclabs.com> wrote:
> Speaking of graphviz, I saw a project the other day that spits out a csv
> that details the fully qualified method names, lines of code, and one or two
> other metrics for a given codebase. I was thinking about pumping that boring
> CSV into Graphviz to see if it would be more interesting. Any interest?
>
> Also where the heck are we meeting?

If we're going to do this group coding experiment (or maybe just group
design) we might need Wifi? Maybe McMennimins Cedar Hills would be
better than Jin Wah for this? Actually, I'm pretty sure the New
Seasons on Cedar Hills has wifi. They seem to have a lot of tables
and chairs in the dining area.

So how about trying the New Seasons on Cedar Hills & Hall? It's a bit
closer to the Beaverton Central (The Round) MAX stop than McMennimin's
is.

Phil