Re: append, push, and add-to-list.

Re: append, push, and add-to-list.

[Drew Adams]

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> But with '() you see that it is (an empty) list:
> 
>   (defvar lst)
>   (setq lst '())

Yes, for human reading, () suggests that the
value might be used as a list, and nil suggests
that it might not be (e.g., it might be used as
a truth value or otherwise).

But there is no reason to quote ().  Like t,
() is evaluates to itself.

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Re: append, push, and add-to-list.

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

Drew Adams wrote:

>> But with '() you see that it is (an empty) list:
>> 
>>   (defvar lst)
>>   (setq lst '())
>
> Yes, for human reading, () suggests that the value might be
> used as a list, and nil suggests that it might not be (e.g.,
> it might be used as a truth value or otherwise).
>
> But there is no reason to quote (). Like t, () is evaluates
> to itself.

Yes, there is a reason, it feels natural because of the way of
creating lists like this '(raz dva tri)

An unquoted list would be, for example, (list 1 2 3) So to
keep it consistent, without a quote, would it be

  (defvar lst)
  (setq lst (list)) ; nil

?

Is it just me, or does Lisp have so many
parenthesis everywhere? '() makes it easier to spot
immediately, hey, that's an empty list.

But ... ultimately one writes code so the computer can execute
it, and not so that a human can read it. So maybe one
shouldn't quote empty lists?

If so, I have 14 corrections to make...

-- 
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Re: append, push, and add-to-list.

[Stefan Monnier via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

> But ... ultimately one writes code so the computer can execute
> it, and not so that a human can read it.  So maybe one
> shouldn't quote empty lists?

You should quote () when you feel like it, and you should not quote it
when you don't feel like it.

Note that this only applies when you originally write the code.  If your
feeling about it changes, that is not a blank check to allow you to
gratuitously change the code to adjust it to your whims.


        Stefan

Re: append, push, and add-to-list.

[tomas]

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On Mon, Jul 05, 2021 at 04:53:44PM +0200, Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor wrote:

[...]

> But ... ultimately one writes code so the computer can execute
> it, and not so that a human can read it. So maybe one
> shouldn't quote empty lists?

There's at least one wise person who put that exactly the other
way around:

  "Programming is the art of telling another human being
   what one wants the computer to do"

   -- D.E.Knuth [1]

Cheers

[1] https://cacm.acm.org/magazines/2012/4/147340-reading-cs-classics/fulltext

 - t

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RE: [External] : Re: append, push, and add-to-list.

[Drew Adams]

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> You should quote () when you feel like it, and you should not quote it
> when you don't feel like it.

Yes.

In general, one might also want to consider that one
feels like writing for other human readers as well. ;-)

But in this case, () vs '(), it's unlikely that either
choice will confuse other readers.

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RE: [External] : Re: append, push, and add-to-list.

[Drew Adams]

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> An unquoted list would be, for example, (list 1 2 3) So to
> keep it consistent, without a quote, would it be
>   (defvar lst)
>   (setq lst (list)) ; nil
> ?

If you really want, yes you can write `(list)'.
That evaluates to nil just like nil, '(), and () do.

`list' is a function.  `(list ...)' is a function call.

() is not a function call.  It's a constant.
It's just alternative _syntax_ for nil.

'() is syntax for the special form `(quote ())'.

All of `(list)', (), '(), and nil evaluate to nil.

> '() makes it easier to spot immediately, hey,
> that's an empty list.

To each their own. ;-)  I don't find '() easier
to spot than ().

> But ... ultimately one writes code so the computer can execute
> it, and not so that a human can read it. So maybe one
> shouldn't quote empty lists?
> 
> If so, I have 14 corrections to make...

No, the computer couldn't care less whether
you write (list), nil, (), or '(). ;-)

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Re: [External] : Re: append, push, and add-to-list.

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

Drew Adams wrote:

> To each their own. ;-) I don't find '() easier to spot than
> ().

It is easier to spot because it has an additional apostrophe
(or apostrophe-quote) compared to (), that makes it more
visibly and makes it stick out compared to all the (( and ))
of `let', `cond', and more, and in general, from all the
parenthesis of Lisp.

>> But ... ultimately one writes code so the computer can
>> execute it, and not so that a human can read it. So maybe
>> one shouldn't quote empty lists?
>> 
>> If so, I have 14 corrections to make...
>
> No, the computer couldn't care less whether
> you write (list), nil, (), or '(). ;-)

... but you yourself said `list' is a function, nil is
a constant (hm... didn't know we had those -

(defun c-constant-symbol (sym len)
  "Create an uneditable symbol for customization buffers.
SYM is the name of the symbol, LEN the length of the field (in
characters) the symbol will be displayed in.  LEN must be big
enough.

This returns a (const ....) structure, suitable for embedding
within a customization type."
  (or (symbolp sym) (error "c-constant-symbol: %s is not a symbol" sym))
  (let* ((name (symbol-name sym))
	 (l (length name))
	 (disp (concat name ":" (make-string (- len l 1) ?\ ))))
    `(const
      :size ,len
      :format ,disp
      :value ,sym))))

- perhaps that's something else since it seems to be just
a list where the first element is const - but here, nil is
unsuited for other reasons - and () is a constant (another,
here more suited syntax, for nil), and '() is another syntax
for (quote ()), which is `quote' a special form?

Maybe the "special form" thing is that it doesn't eval
the argument?

  (setf (quote ...) ...)

Both list and quote are built-in, IOW written in C?

-- 
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Re: append, push, and add-to-list.

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

Stefan Monnier via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor wrote:

> You should quote () when you feel like it, and you should
> not quote it when you don't feel like it.
>
> Note that this only applies when you originally write the
> code. If your feeling about it changes, that is not a blank
> check to allow you to gratuitously change the code to adjust
> it to your whims.

Oh, no!

But I don't remember if I knew () was possible when I wrote
that. Later I saw it in Common Lisp and then I thought, cool,
here you don't need it, now I learn you don't need it Elisp
either...

Wasn't there a civil war in Imperial Russia and the reason was
in what order you'd touch your chest when doing the cross
sign?

They were also taking their programming seriously!

-- 
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Re: append, push, and add-to-list.

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

tomas wrote:

>> But ... ultimately one writes code so the computer can
>> execute it, and not so that a human can read it. So maybe
>> one shouldn't quote empty lists?
>
> There's at least one wise person who put that exactly the
> other way around:
>
>   Programming is the art of telling another human being what
>   one wants the computer to do
>   -- D E Knuth

LaTeX, veeery understandable! Especially when explained to
other humans!

Well, maybe TeX was better in this sense?

We should have a new bible on Computer Science BTW, but this
time in a list format, containing every science/engineering
term including a definition _and_ a minimal example, why not
in Lisp. Then we could just say to every new CS student, "Ah,
so you already know how to program? Good! Now read this book,
and write a mail when you want to do the exam..."

--
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Re: append, push, and add-to-list.

[tomas]

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On Mon, Jul 05, 2021 at 06:58:45PM +0200, Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor wrote:
> tomas wrote:
> 
> >> But ... ultimately one writes code so the computer can
> >> execute it, and not so that a human can read it. So maybe
> >> one shouldn't quote empty lists?
> >
> > There's at least one wise person who put that exactly the
> > other way around:
> >
> >   Programming is the art of telling another human being what
> >   one wants the computer to do
> >   -- D E Knuth
> 
> LaTeX, veeery understandable! Especially when explained to
> other humans!
> 
> Well, maybe TeX was better in this sense?

http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/koans.html

Cheers
 - t

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Re: append, push, and add-to-list.

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

I think I'll change them to `(,@())

-- 
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Re: append, push, and add-to-list.

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

Or `(,@(list))

-- 
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Re: append, push, and add-to-list.

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

> I think I'll change them to `(,@())

Backquote is a Lisp macro tho.

Love the docstring BTW: [I fixed the align for the purpose of
this message]

  [...]
  For example:

  b          => (ba bb bc)       ; assume b has this value
  `(a b c)   => (a b c)          ; backquote acts like quote
  `(a ,b c)  => (a (ba bb bc) c) ; insert the value of b
  `(a ,@b c) => (a ba bb bc c)	; splice in the value of b

"For example" - isn't that exactly, and all, it does?

OK, well, ,b can be _evaluated_ as well, not just inserted as
a value, I guess, that's what they mean?

  `(1 2 ,(format "%s %s!" "Sail" "Ho") 4) => (1 2 "Sail Ho!" 4)

-- 
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Re: append, push, and add-to-list.

[Stefan Monnier via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

Emanuel Berg [2021-07-05 20:11:59] wrote:
> Or `(,@(list))

A bit too obvious, methinks.  Maybe:

    (seq-intersection (seq-filter #'cl-oddp
                                  (seq-map-indexed
                                   (lambda (_ i) i)
                                   (make-list (random 42) nil)))
                      (seq-filter #'cl-evenp
                                  (seq-map-indexed
                                   (lambda (_ i) i)
                                   (make-list (random 42) nil))))


-- Stefan

Re: append, push, and add-to-list.

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

Stefan Monnier via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor wrote:

> A bit too obvious, methinks.  Maybe:
>
>     (seq-intersection (seq-filter #'cl-oddp
>                                   (seq-map-indexed
>                                    (lambda (_ i) i)
>                                    (make-list (random 42) nil)))
>                       (seq-filter #'cl-evenp
>                                   (seq-map-indexed
>                                    (lambda (_ i) i)
>                                    (make-list (random 42) nil))))

(nth integer-width
  (string-to-list "Only this message denotes the empty list"))

-- 
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Re: append, push, and add-to-list.

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

tomas wrote:

>> Well, maybe TeX was better in this sense?
>
> http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/koans.html

This reminds me of one time when I went to
Computer School (CS).

A couple of hundred meters from the school building was an
industrial pit, down there one could see flames every hour of
the day - it was part of the commune's system for disposing
of garbage, possibly.

Anyway one time a group of students including me, 12 in total,
went to see the professor who had walked to this place.
When we got close, he asked, "what is it that you want to hear
from my mouth, that you cannot hear from your own?" To this,
all students started to talk at once so not a single word was
heard. The professor said, "you are too many heads for one
body", and pushed 11 students into the flames.

-- 
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Quote by Knuth

[Jean Louis]

* tomas@tuxteam.de <tomas@tuxteam.de> [2021-07-05 18:42]:
> There's at least one wise person who put that exactly the other
> way around:
> 
>   "Programming is the art of telling another human being
>    what one wants the computer to do"
> 
>    -- D.E.Knuth [1]

Maybe Knuth's quote is related to literate programming. Maybe it is
related to the resulting program and user's view of it.

It mentions "another human being" and not "another programmer"
specifically. 

It is nice to have quotes. 

It is nice to remember that quotes apply only within specific
contexts and that there is no absoluta.

Programs are made for people, users could not care less how is program
really written. They need not know it.

Theoreticall background may be so much distinct from practical
application.

Majority of applications today are for users and their life, business
or entertainment. They care less of what we theoretically speak
about the underlying program. What they want is functional software,
and users often don't even know they are running "software", as terms
changed so much. They may call it by name, like "Open Google" when
they open any kind of browser, they may not know what "browser" ist,
etc. 

-- 
Jean

Take action in Free Software Foundation campaigns:
https://www.fsf.org/campaigns

In support of Richard M. Stallman
https://stallmansupport.org/

Re: append, push, and add-to-list.

[Jean Louis]

* Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor <help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org> [2021-07-05 19:47]:
> But I don't remember if I knew () was possible when I wrote
> that. Later I saw it in Common Lisp and then I thought, cool,
> here you don't need it, now I learn you don't need it Elisp
> either...

I have taken the Lisp manual and started doing something like:

(defun my-fun nil
  (do something))

and I got a digital slap on my finger on the mailing list as I have
not used '() instead of nil.

-- 
Jean

Take action in Free Software Foundation campaigns:
https://www.fsf.org/campaigns

In support of Richard M. Stallman
https://stallmansupport.org/

Re: append, push, and add-to-list.

[Jean Louis]

* Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor <help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org> [2021-07-05 20:00]:
> tomas wrote:
> 
> >> But ... ultimately one writes code so the computer can
> >> execute it, and not so that a human can read it. So maybe
> >> one shouldn't quote empty lists?
> >
> > There's at least one wise person who put that exactly the
> > other way around:
> >
> >   Programming is the art of telling another human being what
> >   one wants the computer to do
> >   -- D E Knuth
> 
> LaTeX, veeery understandable! Especially when explained to
> other humans!
> 
> Well, maybe TeX was better in this sense?

LaTeX has a special audience, like typesetters (if it is write English
word) and writers. For them is understandable. Beside the heading
settings, I can write LaTeX natively without problem.

TeX is actually easier to learn.


-- 
Jean

Take action in Free Software Foundation campaigns:
https://www.fsf.org/campaigns

In support of Richard M. Stallman
https://stallmansupport.org/

Re: append, push, and add-to-list.

[Jean Louis]

* Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor <help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org> [2021-07-05 21:16]:
> Or `(,@(list))

That one is so much easier to spot.

From now on:

(defun my-fun `(,@(list))
  (do something))


-- 
Jean

Take action in Free Software Foundation campaigns:
https://www.fsf.org/campaigns

In support of Richard M. Stallman
https://stallmansupport.org/

Re: Quote by Knuth

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

Jean Louis wrote:

> Maybe Knuth's quote is related to literate programming.

  Literate programming is a programming paradigm introduced by
  Donald Knuth in which a computer program is given an
  explanation of its logic in a natural language, such as
  English, interspersed with snippets of macros and
  traditional source code, from which compilable source code
  can be generated. The approach is used in scientific
  computing and in data science routinely for reproducible
  research and open access purposes. Literate programming
  tools are used by millions of programmers today.
  <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literate_programming>

It is? Mix English and macros and source to generate code?

Sounds like a bad idea if you ask me but who am I to argue
with millions of programmers?

Anyone has an example of this?

> It is nice to have quotes.

Quote wars!

I start:

  You can fire your arrows from the tower of Babylon, but you
  can NEVER strike God!
  -- Apocalypse, "X-Men: Apocalypse" (2016)
  <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LrRPzt8T6J8>

-- 
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Re: append, push, and add-to-list.

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

Jean Louis wrote:

> I have taken the Lisp manual and started doing something
> like:
>
> (defun my-fun nil
>   (do something))
>
> and I got a digital slap on my finger on the mailing list as
> I have not used '() instead of nil.

Yeah, it should look like this

  (defun my-f ()
    (do-something) )

-- 
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Re: append, push, and add-to-list.

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

Jean Louis wrote:

> LaTeX has a special audience, like typesetters (if it is
> write English word) and writers. For them is understandable.
> Beside the heading settings, I can write LaTeX natively
> without problem.

I'd say a general-purpose programming language like Lisp is
ten times easier to explain to anyone compared to the
intricacies of LaTeX, but it also depend on the person, some
people cannot understand programming, and these can't
understand either. I once met a guy who I considered
intelligent enough and I thought I'd draw him a for loop on
a paper, he immediately started to scream in terror about
unrelated things, anything rather than to be put to the test
and fail. Pathetic I guess, but yeah, he just couldn't do it
and he knew it.

Other people can understand a for loop but their minds are so
chaotic while they can understand individual pieces they could
never work on even a small program and hold it to some extent
in their heads at once.

And so on. I didn't believe this was the way, I thought anyone
could learn everything, but after seeing so many people fail at
the above things I now know it isn't so.

> TeX is actually easier to learn.

One would think so.

-- 
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Re: append, push, and add-to-list.

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

Jean Louis wrote:

> From now on:
>
> (defun my-fun `(,@(list))
>   (do something))

Hahaha, but that doesn't work, `defun' is a Lisp macro...

-- 
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Quote by Knuth

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Wednesday, July 07, 2021 at 7:51 AM
> From: "Jean Louis" <bugs@gnu.support>
> To: tomas@tuxteam.de
> Cc: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
> Subject: Quote by Knuth
>
> * tomas@tuxteam.de <tomas@tuxteam.de> [2021-07-05 18:42]:
> > There's at least one wise person who put that exactly the other
> > way around:
> >
> >   "Programming is the art of telling another human being
> >    what one wants the computer to do"
> >
> >    -- D.E.Knuth [1]
>
> Maybe Knuth's quote is related to literate programming. Maybe it is
> related to the resulting program and user's view of it.
>
> It mentions "another human being" and not "another programmer"
> specifically.
>
> It is nice to have quotes.
>
> It is nice to remember that quotes apply only within specific
> contexts and that there is no absoluta.

Knuth was wrong on so many things.  I understand what he means, but
literate programming is not the way.  Have got Joris van der Hoeven -
author of texmacs - fuming when I criticised him, because I did not
do the same with  Donald.  I'm doing it now.

Still, Knuth did a much better job making tex, than Hoeven doing texmacs.
In this regard, texmacs is a very disappointing implementation with a
syntax that no human being will find useful at all.

At the beginning of the computer age (1970) when the long-known algorithms
were first put on computers, they turned out to be highly inefficient.

Therefore, a large part of the work consisted in revisiting classical mathematics
to make it effective and to discover efficient algorithms to implement.

> Programs are made for people, users could not care less how is program
> really written. They need not know it.
>
> Theoreticall background may be so much distinct from practical
> application.
>
> Majority of applications today are for users and their life, business
> or entertainment. They care less of what we theoretically speak
> about the underlying program. What they want is functional software,
> and users often don't even know they are running "software", as terms
> changed so much. They may call it by name, like "Open Google" when
> they open any kind of browser, they may not know what "browser" ist,
> etc.
>
> --
> Jean
>
> Take action in Free Software Foundation campaigns:
> https://www.fsf.org/campaigns
>
> In support of Richard M. Stallman
> https://stallmansupport.org/
>
>

Quote by Knuth

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Wednesday, July 07, 2021 at 8:06 AM
> From: "Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor" <help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org>
> To: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
> Subject: Re: Quote by Knuth
>
> Jean Louis wrote:
>
> > Maybe Knuth's quote is related to literate programming.
>
>   Literate programming is a programming paradigm introduced by
>   Donald Knuth in which a computer program is given an
>   explanation of its logic in a natural language, such as
>   English, interspersed with snippets of macros and
>   traditional source code, from which compilable source code
>   can be generated. The approach is used in scientific
>   computing and in data science routinely for reproducible
>   research and open access purposes. Literate programming
>   tools are used by millions of programmers today.
>   <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literate_programming>
>
> It is? Mix English and macros and source to generate code?
>
> Sounds like a bad idea if you ask me but who am I to argue
> with millions of programmers?

It is a very bad idea.  Mathematician will reject it for serious work.
But for non-serious work or simple notes, there is some benefit.  But
I would not praise it to the young because in schools anything goes these
days.

You can certainly argue with millions of programmers, if you do it consciously.
But perhaps the conclusion has not been part of your experience, so you hesitate.

> Anyone has an example of this?
>
> > It is nice to have quotes.
>
> Quote wars!
>
> I start:
>
>   You can fire your arrows from the tower of Babylon, but you
>   can NEVER strike God!

Because God does not exist.

>   -- Apocalypse, "X-Men: Apocalypse" (2016)
>   <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LrRPzt8T6J8>
>
> --
> underground experts united
> https://dataswamp.org/~incal
>
>
>

Re: Quote by Knuth

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

Christopher Dimech wrote:

> You can certainly argue with millions of programmers, if you
> do it consciously. But perhaps the conclusion has not been
> part of your experience, so you hesitate.

There are no millions of programmers using "literate
programming"...

-- 
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Re: Quote by Knuth

[Alexandre Garreau]

Le mercredi 7 juillet 2021, 00:16:10 CEST Emanuel Berg via Users list for 
the GNU Emacs text editor a écrit :
> Christopher Dimech wrote:
> > You can certainly argue with millions of programmers, if you
> > do it consciously. But perhaps the conclusion has not been
> > part of your experience, so you hesitate.
> 
> There are no millions of programmers using "literate
> programming"...

We should count LaTeX programmers and org-mode users, I think these are 
most of that population.  I’m not even sure of what’s the count of 
programmers worldwide already so well…  Millions could indeed be a great 
exageration.

Quote by Knuth

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Wednesday, July 07, 2021 at 10:26 AM
> From: "Alexandre Garreau" <galex-713@galex-713.eu>
> To: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
> Subject: Re: Quote by Knuth
>
> Le mercredi 7 juillet 2021, 00:16:10 CEST Emanuel Berg via Users list for 
> the GNU Emacs text editor a écrit :
> > Christopher Dimech wrote:
> > > You can certainly argue with millions of programmers, if you
> > > do it consciously. But perhaps the conclusion has not been
> > > part of your experience, so you hesitate.
> > 
> > There are no millions of programmers using "literate
> > programming"...

Mostly they are school children and some academics teaching them.
Nothing serious.

> We should count LaTeX programmers and org-mode users, I think these are 
> most of that population.  I’m not even sure of what’s the count of 
> programmers worldwide already so well…  Millions could indeed be a great 
> exageration.
 
You should not count typesetting as programming.  Producing a document is not
about computation, but a literary text, which by definition has to be a
human literate result.  Scripting languages have also the capability for
human literate results.
 
There are about 16 million programmers in the world.

Re: Quote by Knuth

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

Alexandre Garreau wrote:

> We should count LaTeX programmers and org-mode users,
> I think these are most of that population.

OK, because they use natural language? I don't remember a lot
of natural language (e.g., English) in LaTeX if you exclude
the text of the actual document to be produced, but that
doesn't influence the actual programming part, does it?

> I'm not even sure of what's the count of programmers
> worldwide already so well

First one needs a definition, then a way of counting or
a method of approximating how many people fulfill
that definition.

One can count professional programmers - that doesn't
necessarily say so much about their ability, just that they
earn money from doing it - and one can also count the number
of people who have an education within the field.

Maybe from that number, one can assume something like, for
every such person, 99 additional people know how to do it.

> Millions could indeed be a great exageration

One should remove such statements ("millions"), or replace it
with "several", perhaps...

-- 
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Re: Quote by Knuth

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

Christopher Dimech wrote:

>> There are no millions of programmers using "literate
>> programming"...
>
> Mostly they are school children and some academics teaching
> them.

Teaching them what, exactly?

>> We should count LaTeX programmers and org-mode users,
>> I think these are most of that population. I’m not even
>> sure of what’s the count of programmers worldwide already
>> so well… Millions could indeed be a great exageration.
>
> You should not count typesetting as programming.
> Producing a document is not about computation

LaTeX is domain-specific programming.

> but a literary text, which by definition has to be a human
> literate result. Scripting languages have also the
> capability for human literate results.

All general-purpose languages can do anything with computers,
but often it is much better to use specific tools for
a specific purpose, and LaTeX is one such tool.

> There are about 16 million programmers in the world.

OK?

-- 
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Re: Quote by Knuth

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

> OK, because they use natural language? I don't remember
> a lot of natural language (e.g., English) in LaTeX if you
> exclude the text of the actual document to be produced, but
> that doesn't influence the actual programming part, does it?

Heh, this is like asking if a snake has a tail or if a snake
_is_ a tail...

-- 
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Quote by Knuth

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Thursday, July 15, 2021 at 4:09 AM
> From: "Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor" <help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org>
> To: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
> Subject: Re: Quote by Knuth
>
> Christopher Dimech wrote:
> 
> >> There are no millions of programmers using "literate
> >> programming"...
> >
> > Mostly they are school children and some academics teaching
> > them.
> 
> Teaching them what, exactly?

The literate programming thingies
 
> >> We should count LaTeX programmers and org-mode users,
> >> I think these are most of that population. I’m not even
> >> sure of what’s the count of programmers worldwide already
> >> so well… Millions could indeed be a great exageration.
> >
> > You should not count typesetting as programming.
> > Producing a document is not about computation
> 
> LaTeX is domain-specific programming.
> 
> > but a literary text, which by definition has to be a human
> > literate result. Scripting languages have also the
> > capability for human literate results.
> 
> All general-purpose languages can do anything with computers,
> but often it is much better to use specific tools for
> a specific purpose, and LaTeX is one such tool.
> 
> > There are about 16 million programmers in the world.
> 
> OK?

Someone asked how many
 
> -- 
> underground experts united
> https://dataswamp.org/~incal
> 
> 
>

Quote by Knuth

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Thursday, July 15, 2021 at 4:02 AM
> From: "Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor" <help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org>
> To: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
> Subject: Re: Quote by Knuth
>
> Alexandre Garreau wrote:
>
> > We should count LaTeX programmers and org-mode users,
> > I think these are most of that population.
>
> OK, because they use natural language? I don't remember a lot
> of natural language (e.g., English) in LaTeX if you exclude
> the text of the actual document to be produced, but that
> doesn't influence the actual programming part, does it?

No.  Disregard Latex.  Orgmode is literate because you can run code
among real prose.

> > I'm not even sure of what's the count of programmers
> > worldwide already so well
>
> First one needs a definition, then a way of counting or
> a method of approximating how many people fulfill
> that definition.
>
> One can count professional programmers - that doesn't
> necessarily say so much about their ability, just that they
> earn money from doing it - and one can also count the number
> of people who have an education within the field.

Those with formal education is a good metric for relatively
knowledgeable programmers

> Maybe from that number, one can assume something like, for
> every such person, 99 additional people know how to do it.
>
> > Millions could indeed be a great exageration
>
> One should remove such statements ("millions"), or replace it
> with "several", perhaps...
>
> --
> underground experts united
> https://dataswamp.org/~incal
>
>
>

Re: Quote by Knuth

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

Christopher Dimech wrote:

>> Teaching them what, exactly?
>
> The literate programming thingies

LaTeX and org-mode?

>> OK?
>
> Someone asked how many

How did you arrive at that estimation?

-- 
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Quote by Knuth

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Wednesday, July 07, 2021 at 10:16 AM
> From: "Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor" <help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org>
> To: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
> Subject: Re: Quote by Knuth
>
> Christopher Dimech wrote:
>
> > You can certainly argue with millions of programmers, if you
> > do it consciously. But perhaps the conclusion has not been
> > part of your experience, so you hesitate.
>
> There are no millions of programmers using "literate
> programming"...

Disregarding students and academics almost nobody.

> --
> underground experts united
> https://dataswamp.org/~incal
>
>
>

Re: Quote by Knuth

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

Christopher Dimech wrote:

>> There are no millions of programmers using "literate
>> programming"...
>
> Disregarding students and academics almost nobody.

But isn't org-mode the "normal people" powerhouse of Emacs?

Maybe they are students and academics...

-- 
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Re: Quote by Knuth

[Jean Louis]

* Christopher Dimech <dimech@gmx.com> [2021-07-14 20:45]:
> > There are no millions of programmers using "literate
> > programming"...
> 
> Disregarding students and academics almost nobody.

Documentation strings in Emacs Lisp and commentary are literate
programming. Though we do not have some nice formatter which will
convert each function into nicely printed PDF with sections and
similar. I don't think it is hard to make it in Emacs Lisp

-- 
Jean

Take action in Free Software Foundation campaigns:
https://www.fsf.org/campaigns

In support of Richard M. Stallman
https://stallmansupport.org/

Quote by Knuth

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Thursday, July 15, 2021 at 7:24 AM
> From: "Jean Louis" <bugs@gnu.support>
> To: "Christopher Dimech" <dimech@gmx.com>
> Cc: moasenwood@zoho.eu, help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
> Subject: Re: Quote by Knuth
>
> * Christopher Dimech <dimech@gmx.com> [2021-07-14 20:45]:
> > > There are no millions of programmers using "literate
> > > programming"...
> >
> > Disregarding students and academics almost nobody.
>
> Documentation strings in Emacs Lisp and commentary are literate
> programming. Though we do not have some nice formatter which will
> convert each function into nicely printed PDF with sections and
> similar. I don't think it is hard to make it in Emacs Lisp

Documentation strings are quite limited, Knuth was looking as
something more extensive.

I cannot see how we can make mathematical computations in code literate
because mathematics is full of esoteric glyphs that would complicate
rather than explain. Mixing everything together is a bad idea.

Even if we manage to get computations look like pseudocode, will that
aid understanding?  Not a lot.  It would still need time and focus to
figure out.  In mathematics, using prose gets things so complicated
that you will not understand anything.  You need some sort of compact lexicon
to absorb some quite complex ideas that cannot be condensed well enough
using prose.

After completing a building, you remove the scaffolding and clean everything
out.  Much in then hidden.

> --
> Jean
>
> Take action in Free Software Foundation campaigns:
> https://www.fsf.org/campaigns
>
> In support of Richard M. Stallman
> https://stallmansupport.org/
>

Re: Quote by Knuth

[Marcin Borkowski]

On 2021-07-14, at 22:15, Christopher Dimech <dimech@gmx.com> wrote:

> Even if we manage to get computations look like pseudocode, will that
> aid understanding?  Not a lot.  It would still need time and focus to
> figure out.  In mathematics, using prose gets things so complicated
> that you will not understand anything.  You need some sort of compact lexicon
> to absorb some quite complex ideas that cannot be condensed well enough
> using prose.

I haven't read this thread, just skimmed through a few messages here,
but as a mathematician and a (co)author of two math textbooks I'd like
to add something.

1. I think it's best (in math) to use prose first to explain ideas and
then follow with symbolic notation.

2. Hardly anyone (in the math world) does it (or even tries), which is
sad.

>
> After completing a building, you remove the scaffolding and clean everything
> out.  Much in then hidden.

This is a nice quote.  However, I disagree.  If you remove the
scaffolding you make learning way more difficult.  Even in research
articles I'd leave traces of it (assuming I'd write any research
articles - not very probable).

Best,

-- 
Marcin Borkowski
http://mbork.pl

Quote by Knuth

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Thursday, July 15, 2021 at 8:30 AM
> From: "Marcin Borkowski" <mbork@mbork.pl>
> To: "Christopher Dimech" <dimech@gmx.com>
> Cc: "Jean Louis" <bugs@gnu.support>, help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org, moasenwood@zoho.eu
> Subject: Re: Quote by Knuth
>
>
> On 2021-07-14, at 22:15, Christopher Dimech <dimech@gmx.com> wrote:
>
> > Even if we manage to get computations look like pseudocode, will that
> > aid understanding?  Not a lot.  It would still need time and focus to
> > figure out.  In mathematics, using prose gets things so complicated
> > that you will not understand anything.  You need some sort of compact lexicon
> > to absorb some quite complex ideas that cannot be condensed well enough
> > using prose.
>
> I haven't read this thread, just skimmed through a few messages here,
> but as a mathematician and a (co)author of two math textbooks I'd like
> to add something.
>
> 1. I think it's best (in math) to use prose first to explain ideas and
> then follow with symbolic notation.
>
> 2. Hardly anyone (in the math world) does it (or even tries), which is
> sad.

Mostly the mathematics is done mostly in the mind with some expression
on paper to connect the ideas.

> >
> > After completing a building, you remove the scaffolding and clean everything
> > out.  Much in then hidden.
>
> This is a nice quote.  However, I disagree.  If you remove the
> scaffolding you make learning way more difficult.  Even in research
> articles I'd leave traces of it (assuming I'd write any research
> articles - not very probable).

Depends on the audience.  With mathematicians on the topic, I disregard
quite a lot of things.  It is the same with art like music, painting etc.
Tho focus is on the end product.

You can make something beautiful without the need to explain too much.
Hoping others have the capacity to appreciate.  I used to mix things together
when I started, but not doing that anymore.  Before you try to delve into code,
you need to understand the topic.  But you could hint at some non-trivial
passages if need be.  And then let them think and figure out.

As things are becoming more complicated, today's task is more about conciseness,
otherwise there is no end.  It is all about the minimum threshold you decide to
cater for.  Most times few cared about how I actually did things.


> Best,
>
> --
> Marcin Borkowski
> http://mbork.pl
>

Quote by Knuth

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Thursday, July 15, 2021 at 8:30 AM
> From: "Marcin Borkowski" <mbork@mbork.pl>
> To: "Christopher Dimech" <dimech@gmx.com>
> Cc: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org, moasenwood@zoho.eu, "Jean Louis" <bugs@gnu.support>
> Subject: Re: Quote by Knuth
>
>
> On 2021-07-14, at 22:15, Christopher Dimech <dimech@gmx.com> wrote:
>
> > Even if we manage to get computations look like pseudocode, will that
> > aid understanding?  Not a lot.  It would still need time and focus to
> > figure out.  In mathematics, using prose gets things so complicated
> > that you will not understand anything.  You need some sort of compact lexicon
> > to absorb some quite complex ideas that cannot be condensed well enough
> > using prose.
>
> I haven't read this thread, just skimmed through a few messages here,
> but as a mathematician and a (co)author of two math textbooks I'd like
> to add something.
>
> 1. I think it's best (in math) to use prose first to explain ideas and
> then follow with symbolic notation.
>
> 2. Hardly anyone (in the math world) does it (or even tries), which is
> sad.

Certainly not Ramanujan.  He used to ask: What is proof?  The mathematical
knowledge I display is revealed to me by a goddess. That was it. :)

> >
> > After completing a building, you remove the scaffolding and clean everything
> > out.  Much in then hidden.
>
> This is a nice quote.  However, I disagree.  If you remove the
> scaffolding you make learning way more difficult.  Even in research
> articles I'd leave traces of it (assuming I'd write any research
> articles - not very probable).
>
> Best,
>
> --
> Marcin Borkowski
> http://mbork.pl
>
>

Re: Quote by Knuth

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

Jean Louis wrote:

>>> There are no millions of programmers using "literate
>>> programming"...
>> 
>> Disregarding students and academics almost nobody.
>
> Documentation strings in Emacs Lisp and commentary are
> literate programming. Though we do not have some nice
> formatter which will convert each function into nicely
> printed PDF with sections and similar. I don't think it is
> hard to make it in Emacs Lisp.

But then all programming and programs that have string with
the purpose for humans to read are literate. I'm still looking
for an exact definition...

-- 
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Re: Quote by Knuth

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

Christopher Dimech wrote:

> I cannot see how we can make mathematical computations in
> code literate because mathematics is full of esoteric glyphs
> that would complicate rather than explain. Mixing everything
> together is a bad idea.

You can express math in or as text, that is what LaTeX does
for example. (All programming is or does that in one way or to
some degree or another.)

> Even if we manage to get computations look like pseudocode,
> will that aid understanding?

You can today express all computation as pseudocode or real
code, again that's not the issue.

-- 
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Re: Quote by Knuth

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

Marcin Borkowski wrote:

> I haven't read this thread, just skimmed through a few
> messages here, but as a mathematician and a (co)author of
> two math textbooks I'd like to add something.
>
> 1. I think it's best (in math) to use prose first to explain
>    ideas and then follow with symbolic notation.

Maybe if the ideas are new or if there is some particular
property that is of interest here and there to that document,
so people will get a head start understanding the "symbolic
notation".

For example,

  Researcher at LCU (Limbo City University) have concluded
  that statistically, the third element is where the
  interesting stuff starts:

    a[2]

If the ideas aren't new, one can instead write a paragraph who
came up with it, when, how, and why, and then a second
paragraph how it has been applied (used) in industry and
technology ever since.

But without the symbolic notation it isn't really math, is it,
because the natural language, no matter how careful one is,
can still be misinterpreted, interpreted in several ways, it
can be translated, made fun of ...

> If you remove the scaffolding you make learning way more
> difficult. Even in research articles I'd leave traces of it
> (assuming I'd write any research articles - not very
> probable).

Yeah, textbook and research, more "scaffolding" in
the textbooks, for sure...

-- 
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Re: Quote by Knuth

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

Christopher Dimech wrote:

> Mostly the mathematics is done mostly in the mind with some
> expression on paper to connect the ideas.

COMPUTE-ers, you might have noticed?

-- 
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Re: Quote by Knuth

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

Christopher Dimech wrote:

>> 1. I think it's best (in math) to use prose first to
>> explain ideas and then follow with symbolic notation.
>>
>> 2. Hardly anyone (in the math world) does it (or even
>> tries), which is sad.
>
> Certainly not Ramanujan. He used to ask: What is proof?
> The mathematical knowledge I display is revealed to me by
> a goddess. That was it. :)

Well, one can say whatever comes to mind to a journalist when
both are on LSD, but surely his math wasn't like that...

-- 
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Quote by Knuth

[Christopher Dimech]

Literate programming is an enhanced macro substitution package tuned to the task
of rearranging source code. This may seem like a trivial change, but in fact is
quite different from other ways of structuring software systems.

Literacy in programming means different things in different circumstances.
Many jobs are about getting a job done, rather than showing literacy, except
in academia, mostly written by young inexperienced idiots on low pay or no pay
at all.

A mathematician in industry can do as much literate programming as one wants
but is not considered valuable work.  When a company takes over another, they
mostly trash the other system and use their own way.  That's what happened to
me a number of times.

> Sent: Thursday, July 15, 2021 at 10:31 AM
> From: "Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor" <help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org>
> To: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
> Subject: Re: Quote by Knuth
>
> Jean Louis wrote:
>
> >>> There are no millions of programmers using "literate
> >>> programming"...
> >>
> >> Disregarding students and academics almost nobody.
> >
> > Documentation strings in Emacs Lisp and commentary are
> > literate programming. Though we do not have some nice
> > formatter which will convert each function into nicely
> > printed PDF with sections and similar. I don't think it is
> > hard to make it in Emacs Lisp.
>
> But then all programming and programs that have string with
> the purpose for humans to read are literate. I'm still looking
> for an exact definition...
>
> --
> underground experts united
> https://dataswamp.org/~incal
>
>
>

Quote by Knuth

[Christopher Dimech]

Have not seen extensive work being done in org mode.  I somehimes use it for a quick
calculation of an idea.

> Sent: Thursday, July 15, 2021 at 5:49 AM
> From: "Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor" <help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org>
> To: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
> Subject: Re: Quote by Knuth
>
> Christopher Dimech wrote:
>
> >> There are no millions of programmers using "literate
> >> programming"...
> >
> > Disregarding students and academics almost nobody.
>
> But isn't org-mode the "normal people" powerhouse of Emacs?
>
> Maybe they are students and academics...

Have not seen extensive work being done in org mode.  I sometimes use it for a quick
calculation of an idea.

In mathematics, I have seen people using mathematica notebooks, certainly not org-mode.
Literate programming is for me for taking notes and test well contained stuff.



> --
> underground experts united
> https://dataswamp.org/~incal
>
>
>

Quote by Knuth

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Thursday, July 15, 2021 at 5:41 AM
> From: "Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor" <help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org>
> To: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
> Subject: Re: Quote by Knuth
>
> Christopher Dimech wrote:
>
> >> Teaching them what, exactly?
> >
> > The literate programming thingies
>
> LaTeX and org-mode?

LaTeX is not about actual computation, but the production of a document.
Org-mode would be a good example.

> >> OK?
> >
> > Someone asked how many
>
> How did you arrive at that estimation?

You can find information for the US on
https://datausa.io/profile/cip/computer-science-110701

Other countries also have statistics.


> --
> underground experts united
> https://dataswamp.org/~incal
>
>
>

Re: Quote by Knuth

[Marcin Borkowski]

On 2021-07-15, at 00:53, Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor <help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org> wrote:

> But without the symbolic notation it isn't really math, is it,
> because the natural language, no matter how careful one is,
> can still be misinterpreted, interpreted in several ways, it
> can be translated, made fun of ...

Interesting, but false.  What Greeks did was most certainly mathematics
even if they had little to none symbolism.

Also, there's plenty of room for misinterpretation in some mathematical
notations (multivariate anaylsis comes to mind).

Best,

-- 
Marcin Borkowski
http://mbork.pl

Quote by Knuth

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Thursday, July 15, 2021 at 6:06 PM
> From: "Marcin Borkowski" <mbork@mbork.pl>
> To: "Emanuel Berg" <moasenwood@zoho.eu>
> Cc: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
> Subject: Re: Quote by Knuth
>
>
> On 2021-07-15, at 00:53, Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor <help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org> wrote:
>
> > But without the symbolic notation it isn't really math, is it,
> > because the natural language, no matter how careful one is,
> > can still be misinterpreted, interpreted in several ways, it
> > can be translated, made fun of ...
>
> Interesting, but false.  What Greeks did was most certainly mathematics
> even if they had little to none symbolism.

We don't do greek mathematics anymore.  It was mainly geometric, which became
an ingrained technique that stall development until Liebniz introduced some useful
notation.  Magneto-Hydro-Dynamics needs compact notation.  Inverse Estimation
is another example.

> Also, there's plenty of room for misinterpretation in some mathematical
> notations (multivariate analysis comes to mind).

That is also true, development good notation that helps is a difficult part when
doing mathematics.

> Best,
>
> --
> Marcin Borkowski
> http://mbork.pl
>
>

Re: Quote by Knuth

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: Christopher Dimech <dimech@gmx.com>
> Date: Thu, 15 Jul 2021 04:58:29 +0200
> Cc: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
> 
> Many jobs are about getting a job done, rather than showing literacy, except
> in academia, mostly written by young inexperienced idiots on low pay or no pay
> at all.

I guess you never had to maintain large complex programs written by
someone else, who has long ago left the organization and is not
available for help.  Happens in my line of daytime work all the time.
(Heck, even Emacs maintenance and development present this very
problem quite frequently.)  That's when you value every single bit of
explanation "written by idiots" about what the program does and how.

Re: Quote by Knuth

[tomas]

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On Thu, Jul 15, 2021 at 05:05:00AM +0200, Christopher Dimech wrote:
> 
> Have not seen extensive work being done in org mode.  I somehimes use it for a quick
> calculation of an idea.

That's because you're not paying attention.

Cheers
 - t

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Quote by Knuth

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Thursday, July 15, 2021 at 6:50 PM
> From: tomas@tuxteam.de
> To: "Christopher Dimech" <dimech@gmx.com>
> Cc: moasenwood@zoho.eu, help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
> Subject: Re: Quote by Knuth
>
> On Thu, Jul 15, 2021 at 05:05:00AM +0200, Christopher Dimech wrote:
> >
> > Have not seen extensive work being done in org mode.  I somehimes use it for a quick
> > calculation of an idea.
>
> That's because you're not paying attention.

Is that right?  Who is doing extensive work with org-mode and on which topic?

> Cheers
>  - t
>

Re: Quote by Knuth

[tomas]

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 302 bytes --]

On Thu, Jul 15, 2021 at 08:55:22AM +0200, Christopher Dimech wrote:

[tomas]

> > That's because you're not paying attention.
> 
> Is that right?  Who is doing extensive work with org-mode and on which topic?

Posted (I believe) in emacs-orgmode:

  https://arxiv.org/abs/2106.05096

-- t

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Quote by Knuth

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Thursday, July 15, 2021 at 7:11 PM
> From: tomas@tuxteam.de
> To: "Christopher Dimech" <dimech@gmx.com>
> Cc: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org, moasenwood@zoho.eu
> Subject: Re: Quote by Knuth
>
> On Thu, Jul 15, 2021 at 08:55:22AM +0200, Christopher Dimech wrote:
>
> [tomas]
>
> > > That's because you're not paying attention.
> >
> > Is that right?  Who is doing extensive work with org-mode and on which topic?
>
> Posted (I believe) in emacs-orgmode:
>
>   https://arxiv.org/abs/2106.05096

But the actual work was done in Julia, that was what I was trying to say.  It is not the
actual work being done in org-mode.  Simply a document using gnuplot to plot.  But that's
about it.

> -- t
>

Re: Quote by Knuth

[Marcin Borkowski]

On 2021-07-15, at 08:21, Christopher Dimech <dimech@gmx.com> wrote:

>> Sent: Thursday, July 15, 2021 at 6:06 PM
>> From: "Marcin Borkowski" <mbork@mbork.pl>
>> To: "Emanuel Berg" <moasenwood@zoho.eu>
>> Cc: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
>> Subject: Re: Quote by Knuth
>>
>>
>> On 2021-07-15, at 00:53, Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor <help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org> wrote:
>>
>> > But without the symbolic notation it isn't really math, is it,
>> > because the natural language, no matter how careful one is,
>> > can still be misinterpreted, interpreted in several ways, it
>> > can be translated, made fun of ...
>>
>> Interesting, but false.  What Greeks did was most certainly mathematics
>> even if they had little to none symbolism.
>
> We don't do greek mathematics anymore.  It was mainly geometric, which became
> an ingrained technique that stall development until Liebniz introduced some useful
> notation.  Magneto-Hydro-Dynamics needs compact notation.  Inverse Estimation
> is another example.

Well, don't we do the very same mathematics as ancient Greeks did, only
expressing it in a different language?  (And of course, we now know
more, since our knowledge grows.  OTOH, many things in contemporary
mathematics are not very trustworthy due to the complexity and high
probability of errors.)

Best,

-- 
Marcin Borkowski
http://mbork.pl

Quote by Knuth

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Sunday, July 18, 2021 at 6:43 AM
> From: "Marcin Borkowski" <mbork@mbork.pl>
> To: "Christopher Dimech" <dimech@gmx.com>
> Cc: "Emanuel Berg" <moasenwood@zoho.eu>, help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
> Subject: Re: Quote by Knuth
>
>
> On 2021-07-15, at 08:21, Christopher Dimech <dimech@gmx.com> wrote:
>
> >> Sent: Thursday, July 15, 2021 at 6:06 PM
> >> From: "Marcin Borkowski" <mbork@mbork.pl>
> >> To: "Emanuel Berg" <moasenwood@zoho.eu>
> >> Cc: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
> >> Subject: Re: Quote by Knuth
> >>
> >>
> >> On 2021-07-15, at 00:53, Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor <help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org> wrote:
> >>
> >> > But without the symbolic notation it isn't really math, is it,
> >> > because the natural language, no matter how careful one is,
> >> > can still be misinterpreted, interpreted in several ways, it
> >> > can be translated, made fun of ...
> >>
> >> Interesting, but false.  What Greeks did was most certainly mathematics
> >> even if they had little to none symbolism.
> >
> > We don't do greek mathematics anymore.  It was mainly geometric, which became
> > an ingrained technique that stall development until Liebniz introduced some useful
> > notation.  Magneto-Hydro-Dynamics needs compact notation.  Inverse Estimation
> > is another example.
>
> Well, don't we do the very same mathematics as ancient Greeks did, only
> expressing it in a different language?  (And of course, we now know
> more, since our knowledge grows.  OTOH, many things in contemporary
> mathematics are not very trustworthy due to the complexity and high
> probability of errors.)

I understand that.  About twenty years ago, I tried it.  It gets things
even more complicated than they are.  I rather have a number of small
well contained implementations.  I disagree with Knuth that a practitioner
of literate programming becomes an essayist, whose main concern is with
exposition and excellence of style, rather than how to perform the actual
computation.

The biggest problem has always been how to do something, rather than how to
describe it.  I gave up trying to put everything in one file.  What is need is
good categorisation of the different aspects involved.  Though, categorisation
is very time consuming.  I see many writing scholarly papers describing things
which are actually useless.  What happens is that the problem could get exasperated.

And if done by students the problems will became even worse.  Computation is today
still very far from the archaic system many mathematics departments operate.

I know a few professors myself claiming to work on the dynamic properties of everything
and the bullshit they say they have developed.  They say they develop the theories,
they develop the computational algorithms needed, they do everything.  Until you do some
work with them and realise there's not much to their work.  Welcome to the world of academia
in the western world.

Consider Ramanujan and Perelman for instance.  Both have worked from some pit hole making
great soup.  Modern societies have started treating everything as in some state of illness.
The second largest industry on the planet is pharmaceuticals, which makes too much lousy soup.

You just have to look at how the development of the coronavirus vaccines are happening !
Everyday, you have to add something else to them, else they won't work.  If you're constantly creating nasty chemistry, how can life within you understand that you're seeking well-being?

Re: Quote by Knuth

[Jean Louis]

* Christopher Dimech <dimech@gmx.com> [2021-07-18 10:43]:
> > Well, don't we do the very same mathematics as ancient Greeks did, only
> > expressing it in a different language?  (And of course, we now know
> > more, since our knowledge grows.  OTOH, many things in contemporary
> > mathematics are not very trustworthy due to the complexity and high
> > probability of errors.)
> 
> I understand that.  About twenty years ago, I tried it.  It gets things
> even more complicated than they are.  I rather have a number of small
> well contained implementations.  I disagree with Knuth that a practitioner
> of literate programming becomes an essayist, whose main concern is with
> exposition and excellence of style, rather than how to perform the actual
> computation.

If you would be the inventor of such an excellent typesetting system
such as TeX you would have that good idea that other people should
learn and apply it as well.

By all means I do agree with Knuth, though in limited manner and
specifically to context of the work or to specific domains or specific
branches of the work. 

For majority of Emacs packages that is really not necessary as there
are documentation strings or docstrings. That is literate
enough. Print the Emacs package and read the docstrings. Or one can
generate the list of functions in the package and format it it nicer
and get somewhat nicer printout. But Emacs packages do not really
control crucial or very responsible domains of human activities.

Who cares if some frame or window makes a problem, even if Emacs
crashes there are remedies, if some highlighting is not correct,
somebody will need to correct it but it does not impact large number
of people.

Literate programming is highly necessary in crucial and high
responsibility related applications. Let us say applications
concerning handling of nuclear power plants, any other energy related
applications, medical applications, satellite control, communication
control. One simply SHOULD NOT program without good description on
what that program does and how. Literate programming would also help
the programmer easier to solve the problems before the program come to
shape. 

That I personally just start the function because I write what I think
is far from being understood in some future. It cannot be
demonstratably easily understood on this mailing list even by
experienced and more skilled people. Our thoughts do not align to
other people thoughts and so our programs may look quite different
from one to each other. Then future programmer may need to rewrite
functions or improve upon it. In fact there should be a program that
rewrites it in other new or more powerful programming language.

Project has been programmed, it is finished and years pass, now come
the new generation and that generation of people should be able to
understand all details of the program in general. That understanding
would come from literate programming.

In general, when there are simpler programs why complicate and make it
too much literate? We can see that there is no reason for that in
practice. One README or INSTALLATION file and docstrings and
commentaries are obviously our practical way of literate
programming.

The demand for literate programming depends on the importance of the
program. 

> I know a few professors myself claiming to work on the dynamic
> properties of everything and the bullshit they say they have
> developed.  They say they develop the theories, they develop the
> computational algorithms needed, they do everything.  Until you do
> some work with them and realise there's not much to their work.
> Welcome to the world of academia in the western world.

That is how it is, among those useless there will be number of useful
inventions. I see that as a ratio and ratio has to be upheld. Maybe
the ratio of useless invention is 80 to 20 of useful inventions, but
if you do not uphold the ratio then you will get less useful
inventions in future.


-- 
Jean

Take action in Free Software Foundation campaigns:
https://www.fsf.org/campaigns

In support of Richard M. Stallman
https://stallmansupport.org/

Quote by Knuth

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Sunday, July 18, 2021 at 11:50 PM
> From: "Jean Louis" <bugs@gnu.support>
> To: "Christopher Dimech" <dimech@gmx.com>
> Cc: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org, "Emanuel Berg" <moasenwood@zoho.eu>
> Subject: Re: Quote by Knuth
>
> * Christopher Dimech <dimech@gmx.com> [2021-07-18 10:43]:
> > > Well, don't we do the very same mathematics as ancient Greeks did, only
> > > expressing it in a different language?  (And of course, we now know
> > > more, since our knowledge grows.  OTOH, many things in contemporary
> > > mathematics are not very trustworthy due to the complexity and high
> > > probability of errors.)
> >
> > I understand that.  About twenty years ago, I tried it.  It gets things
> > even more complicated than they are.  I rather have a number of small
> > well contained implementations.  I disagree with Knuth that a practitioner
> > of literate programming becomes an essayist, whose main concern is with
> > exposition and excellence of style, rather than how to perform the actual
> > computation.
>
> If you would be the inventor of such an excellent typesetting system
> such as TeX you would have that good idea that other people should
> learn and apply it as well.

Knuth is over-rated.  He did not invent anything.  Mathematical type-setting
had existed long before Knuth.  Today people have became obsessed with
typesetting, even though the most important thing is the information within
rather on how nice an alpha can be printed.


> By all means I do agree with Knuth, though in limited manner and
> specifically to context of the work or to specific domains or specific
> branches of the work.

Yes, in a very very limited manner.

> For majority of Emacs packages that is really not necessary as there
> are documentation strings or docstrings. That is literate
> enough. Print the Emacs package and read the docstrings. Or one can
> generate the list of functions in the package and format it it nicer
> and get somewhat nicer printout. But Emacs packages do not really
> control crucial or very responsible domains of human activities.

Correct.  But Knuth idea goes more than that because he was obsessed with
presentation and wanted science to be like a work of literature.  Without
understanding that most work is not work of literature.

> Who cares if some frame or window makes a problem, even if Emacs
> crashes there are remedies, if some highlighting is not correct,
> somebody will need to correct it but it does not impact large number
> of people.

Well said.

> Literate programming is highly necessary in crucial and high
> responsibility related applications. Let us say applications
> concerning handling of nuclear power plants, any other energy related
> applications, medical applications, satellite control, communication
> control. One simply SHOULD NOT program without good description on
> what that program does and how. Literate programming would also help
> the programmer easier to solve the problems before the program come to
> shape.

Nuclear power plants are simply engineering.  Things are never done as you think
even for nuclear and medical applications.  As long as things work relatively
well, the corporations and their engineers are happy.     There are enormous
risks which nobody cares about.  Otherwise nothing will get accomplished.

> That I personally just start the function because I write what I think
> is far from being understood in some future. It cannot be
> demonstratably easily understood on this mailing list even by
> experienced and more skilled people. Our thoughts do not align to
> other people thoughts and so our programs may look quite different
> from one to each other. Then future programmer may need to rewrite
> functions or improve upon it. In fact there should be a program that
> rewrites it in other new or more powerful programming language.

Yes, people got to understand well what you have said.

> Project has been programmed, it is finished and years pass, now come
> the new generation and that generation of people should be able to
> understand all details of the program in general. That understanding
> would come from literate programming.

Mostly they trash it than trying to understand.  That happened to me.  Simply
gave up and done things again as I understand them.

> In general, when there are simpler programs why complicate and make it
> too much literate? We can see that there is no reason for that in
> practice. One README or INSTALLATION file and docstrings and
> commentaries are obviously our practical way of literate
> programming.

Yes, many times being too literate means many will skip most of what is written.

> The demand for literate programming depends on the importance of the
> program.
>
> > I know a few professors myself claiming to work on the dynamic
> > properties of everything and the bullshit they say they have
> > developed.  They say they develop the theories, they develop the
> > computational algorithms needed, they do everything.  Until you do
> > some work with them and realise there's not much to their work.
> > Welcome to the world of academia in the western world.
>
> That is how it is, among those useless there will be number of useful
> inventions. I see that as a ratio and ratio has to be upheld. Maybe
> the ratio of useless invention is 80 to 20 of useful inventions, but
> if you do not uphold the ratio then you will get less useful
> inventions in future.

You just have to see the number of citations in academic journals. Almost 44% of all
published manuscripts are never cited. Today there are so may articles that I hardly
read anything.

In a time-frame of ten years, the top 1% researchers in physics and mathematics
had about 2073 citations.   If you have even 1 citation for a manuscript you are
already in the top 55.8%.  With 10 or more citations, your work is now in the top
24% of the most cited work worldwide; this increases to the top 1.8% as you reach
100 or more citations.

Main take home message: the average citation per manuscript is clearly below 10!

I found an article by Scott Weingart, who gave very similar results, with 50% of
all published papers in the journal Scientometrics having fewer than 4 citations,
70% fewer than 7.

http://www.scottbot.net/HIAL/index.html@p=22108.html

Would I care about literate programming.  Hell no!

> --
> Jean
>
> Take action in Free Software Foundation campaigns:
> https://www.fsf.org/campaigns
>
> In support of Richard M. Stallman
> https://stallmansupport.org/
>
>

Re: Quote by Knuth

[Jean Louis]

* Christopher Dimech <dimech@gmx.com> [2021-07-18 16:18]:
> Knuth is over-rated.  He did not invent anything.  Mathematical type-setting
> had existed long before Knuth.  Today people have became obsessed with
> typesetting, even though the most important thing is the information within
> rather on how nice an alpha can be printed.

When I see this email, I can read it as I know the expected format and
I can quickly read and grasp. When I see typographical errors in a
document which is so often the case with people using proprietary
Microsoft Word, I tend to slow down and get as if author did not put
attention on correct writing then it also influences
understanding. Small things do matter and help in faster reading and
thus faster learning. Without it, the information within one cannot
easily understand or one may get difficulties. It just happens that I
receive various applications written that way. Then I think if author
did not put attention on proper writing then which other numbers are
also neglected? This indication discovery method happen to be true all
of the times. When you see serious formatting mistakes, you should
know it is a tip of the iceberg. It does relate to literacy.

> > Project has been programmed, it is finished and years pass, now come
> > the new generation and that generation of people should be able to
> > understand all details of the program in general. That understanding
> > would come from literate programming.
> 
> Mostly they trash it than trying to understand.  That happened to
> me.  Simply gave up and done things again as I understand them.

Is this because they rewrote it in other programming language?

Why not recommend Emacs Lisp? It is quite good for many office tasks.


-- 
Jean

Take action in Free Software Foundation campaigns:
https://www.fsf.org/campaigns

In support of Richard M. Stallman
https://stallmansupport.org/

Quote by Knuth

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Sunday, July 18, 2021 at 6:43 AM
> From: "Marcin Borkowski" <mbork@mbork.pl>
> To: "Christopher Dimech" <dimech@gmx.com>
> Cc: "Emanuel Berg" <moasenwood@zoho.eu>, help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
> Subject: Re: Quote by Knuth
>
>
> On 2021-07-15, at 08:21, Christopher Dimech <dimech@gmx.com> wrote:
>
> >> Sent: Thursday, July 15, 2021 at 6:06 PM
> >> From: "Marcin Borkowski" <mbork@mbork.pl>
> >> To: "Emanuel Berg" <moasenwood@zoho.eu>
> >> Cc: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
> >> Subject: Re: Quote by Knuth
> >>
> >>
> >> On 2021-07-15, at 00:53, Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor <help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org> wrote:
> >>
> >> > But without the symbolic notation it isn't really math, is it,
> >> > because the natural language, no matter how careful one is,
> >> > can still be misinterpreted, interpreted in several ways, it
> >> > can be translated, made fun of ...
> >>
> >> Interesting, but false.  What Greeks did was most certainly mathematics
> >> even if they had little to none symbolism.
> >
> > We don't do greek mathematics anymore.  It was mainly geometric, which became
> > an ingrained technique that stall development until Liebniz introduced some useful
> > notation.  Magneto-Hydro-Dynamics needs compact notation.  Inverse Estimation
> > is another example.
>
> Well, don't we do the very same mathematics as ancient Greeks did, only
> expressing it in a different language?  (And of course, we now know
> more, since our knowledge grows.  OTOH, many things in contemporary
> mathematics are not very trustworthy due to the complexity and high
> probability of errors.)

We don't do the same mathematics as ancient Greeks did.  Greeks mathematics
can be understood by many people.  Then came Differential and Integral
Calculus (and fractional calculus, tensor calculus), mostly covered in
undergraduate mathematics, considered difficult by non-mathematicians, but
within grasp of 20 year olds.  With Special Relativity and beyond, very few
understand the mathematics of 100 years ago.  With current published mathematics,
much of it goes beyond graduate level, some so specialised that only if you work
directly in that specific field would you understand the notation.

Go to a lecture by Simon Donaldson at Imperial, and tell me how much you would
understand his particular solution to the equations of Yang-Mills Gauge Theory.
Or about how the Hermitian-Einstein Metric is well-defined in a holomorphic vector
bundle.

His most recent work centers on complex differential geometry and the existence of
Kahler metrics.

Quote by Knuth

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Monday, July 19, 2021 at 1:41 AM
> From: "Jean Louis" <bugs@gnu.support>
> To: "Christopher Dimech" <dimech@gmx.com>
> Cc: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org, "Emanuel Berg" <moasenwood@zoho.eu>
> Subject: Re: Quote by Knuth
>
> * Christopher Dimech <dimech@gmx.com> [2021-07-18 16:18]:
> > Knuth is over-rated.  He did not invent anything.  Mathematical type-setting
> > had existed long before Knuth.  Today people have became obsessed with
> > typesetting, even though the most important thing is the information within
> > rather on how nice an alpha can be printed.
>
> When I see this email, I can read it as I know the expected format and
> I can quickly read and grasp. When I see typographical errors in a
> document which is so often the case with people using proprietary
> Microsoft Word, I tend to slow down and get as if author did not put
> attention on correct writing then it also influences
> understanding. Small things do matter and help in faster reading and
> thus faster learning. Without it, the information within one cannot
> easily understand or one may get difficulties. It just happens that I
> receive various applications written that way. Then I think if author
> did not put attention on proper writing then which other numbers are
> also neglected? This indication discovery method happen to be true all
> of the times. When you see serious formatting mistakes, you should
> know it is a tip of the iceberg. It does relate to literacy.
>
> > > Project has been programmed, it is finished and years pass, now come
> > > the new generation and that generation of people should be able to
> > > understand all details of the program in general. That understanding
> > > would come from literate programming.

Most are only interested to fix something or add something rather than understand it.
Used to work at a number of companies using software that nobody understood mathematically.
I was the only mathematician they had, and I have to tell you that my work was secretly
being funded by public money through some shady deal with the british government.

There were a few small companies that developed math composition software before tex.
One was Science Typographers, whose program was used at tho American Mathematical
Society for about 20 years.

> > Mostly they trash it than trying to understand.  That happened to
> > me.  Simply gave up and done things again as I understand them.
>
> Is this because they rewrote it in other programming language?

Mostly because they got their own system and know it very well.  It is considered
waste of money to have someone spend more than a few weeks going through another
company's code to understand it.  Basically they keep a copy somewhere, but in the
end almost nobody ever looks at the takeover code of other companies after acquisitions.

The programming language is not so important, but how things work together is.

> Why not recommend Emacs Lisp? It is quite good for many office tasks.
>
>
> --
> Jean
>
> Take action in Free Software Foundation campaigns:
> https://www.fsf.org/campaigns
>
> In support of Richard M. Stallman
> https://stallmansupport.org/
>

Re: Quote by Knuth

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

Christopher Dimech wrote:

> Literate programming is an enhanced macro substitution
> package tuned to the task of rearranging source code.

We know what a macro is but what is literate programming
except it relies on macros? Does it rely to macros MORE than
everyday programming, including programming that uses macros,
or are the macros CLOSER to natural languages, maybe?

If it has a name (literate programming) there should be
a snappy definition, otherwise I'll stick to illiterate
programming, thank you...

> but in fact is quite different from other ways of
> structuring software systems.

Uhm, okay, what ways are those?

> Literacy in programming means different things in different
> circumstances. Many jobs are about getting a job done,
> rather than showing literacy, except in academia, mostly
> written by young inexperienced idiots on low pay or no pay
> at all.

What are you talking about?

> A mathematician in industry can do as much literate
> programming as one wants but is not considered valuable
> work. When a company takes over another, they mostly trash
> the other system and use their own way. That's what happened
> to me a number of times.

?

-- 
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Re: Quote by Knuth

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

Christopher Dimech wrote:

> Have not seen extensive work being done in org mode.

Oh, no, people use it, LaTeX is too difficult/slow and one
tend to end up polishing the details forever in
a (re)compilation loop that's endless, almost, is what they
think, at least.

Do I agree? Yes, but at the same time that complexity and
control over the details are the strengths of it.

If one do one document in LaTeX, then polish it like crazy
forever until the result is perfect, then one can use these
same settings again for the next document and ever document
ever on, just type the contents and compile and ship...

So one can have the best of both worlds!

Well, in theory at least ;)

-- 
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Re: Quote by Knuth

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

Christopher Dimech wrote:

> Is that right? Who is doing extensive work with org-mode and
> on which topic?

What are you talking about, what is "extensive work"?

People use org-mode, if they use anything Emacs, that's it!

-- 
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Re: Quote by Knuth

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

Christopher Dimech wrote:

> LaTeX is not about actual computation, but the production of
> a document.

LaTeX has algorithms so it is computing.

Don't know what "actual computation" is tho? Actually?

-- 
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Re: Quote by Knuth

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

Marcin Borkowski wrote:

>> But without the symbolic notation it isn't really math, is
>> it, because the natural language, no matter how careful one
>> is, can still be misinterpreted, interpreted in several
>> ways, it can be translated, made fun of ...
>
> Interesting, but false. What Greeks did was most certainly
> mathematics even if they had little to none symbolism.

OK, well, no disrespect to them, but pioneers don't always get
it right just because their overall contribution is huge for
pushing the boundaries, for example in physics and astronomy
several thousand years ago they often referred to God in their
attempts to argue and "prove" things, and we don't consider
that part of physics or astronomy *today*.

Can you do math today without a notation, and even so, why
would you?

You can hammer without a hammer (use the back side of an axe)
but no construction working will bring an axe to his
work-place and make this argument...

> Also, there's plenty of room for misinterpretation in some
> mathematical notations (multivariate anaylsis comes to
> mind).

OK, maybe that will be formalized and agree upon some day as
well!

-- 
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Re: Quote by Knuth

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

Marcin Borkowski wrote:

> Well, don't we do the very same mathematics as ancient
> Greeks did, only expressing it in a different language?

Indeed, but this language is much better.

-- 
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Re: Quote by Knuth

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

Christopher Dimech wrote:

> I understand that. About twenty years ago, I tried it.
> It gets things even more complicated than they are.

Yes, of course, as macros involve yet another layer
in-between. You don't write source to do stuff, you write
source to write source to do stuff.

> I rather have a number of small well contained
> implementations. I disagree with Knuth that a practitioner
> of literate programming becomes an essayist, whose main
> concern is with exposition and excellence of style, rather
> than how to perform the actual computation.

Aha, so that's the idea/vision! Well, how poetic! But very
impractical in all the easy cases, and even more so in the
difficult ones.

> The biggest problem has always been how to do something,
> rather than how to describe it.

Well, these are two different tendencies, and where they all
lead, only Jehovah knows. For example the thought with C++,
C with classes, solve the problem by creating a model (an OO
model) of it. An interesting thought that lead to a small
revolution of the ... computer game industry? And today, the
C++ enthusiasts are often not enthusiastic about OO. "It was
big in the 90s, but ..."

> I gave up trying to put everything in one file.

Say what, of course you can't do that :)

> And if done by students the problems will became even worse.

OK, so what group do you belong to? Please tell so we can
generalize negatively about them.

> I know a few professors myself claiming to work on the
> dynamic properties of everything and the bullshit they say
> they have developed. They say they develop the theories,
> they develop the computational algorithms needed, they do
> everything. Until you do some work with them and realise
> there's not much to their work. Welcome to the world of
> academia in the western world.
>
> Consider Ramanujan and Perelman for instance. Both have
> worked from some pit hole making great soup.
> Modern societies have started treating everything as in some
> state of illness. The second largest industry on the planet
> is pharmaceuticals, which makes too much lousy soup.
>
> You just have to look at how the development of the
> coronavirus vaccines are happening ! Everyday, you have to
> add something else to them, else they won't work. If you're
> constantly creating nasty chemistry, how can life within you
> understand that you're seeking well-being?

Hm ... maybe the group is people with justice
obsession syndrome? If so, yeah, they stink.

-- 
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Re: Quote by Knuth

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

Jean Louis wrote:

> For majority of Emacs packages that is really not necessary
> as there are documentation strings or docstrings.

For it to be literate programming you would stop programming
in the conventional sense, instead you would write in what is
much closer to a natural language, all that you'd write would
look like for example English but is actually _macro code_
which describes the problem to be solved, then that is
compiled into _actual_ source code that, in turn, solves
the problem.

So in the Emacs world, literate programming would not be
docstrings but macros...

-- 
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Re: Quote by Knuth

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

Christopher Dimech wrote:

> But Knuth idea goes more than that because he was obsessed
> with presentation and wanted science to be like a work of
> literature. Without understanding that most work is not work
> of literature.

But that's very normal and, broadly speaking, expected for
a man with the turns that his career took. What would you
expect, the creator of TeX saying, "hey, why do you guys care
so much what the documents _look_ like?" ???

Well, _he_ for one cared about that and he developed a good
tool for that!

"Literate programming" was his way of theorizing about TeX and
the family of tools and methods he developed, pushed for, and
cared for. I understand that now, it wasn't hyped as
a superior model for programming in general. Then it makes
much more sense.

-- 
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Re: Quote by Knuth

[tomas]

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 1900 bytes --]

On Mon, Jul 19, 2021 at 12:14:18AM +0200, Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor wrote:
> Christopher Dimech wrote:
> 
> > Literate programming is an enhanced macro substitution
> > package tuned to the task of rearranging source code.
> 
> We know what a macro is but what is literate programming
> except it relies on macros? Does it rely to macros MORE than
> everyday programming, including programming that uses macros,
> or are the macros CLOSER to natural languages, maybe?

This discussion is so full of category errors that it's difficult
to say anything relevant anymore. Let me pick two senses for
the term "literate programming":

"Literate programming" is a pretty generic term. The most you
can say about it is that it tries to combine "writing for humans"
("literature") and "writing for machines" ("programming"). Talking
about macros in this context would be a category error [0] like
saying "Colorless green ideas sleep furiously".

"Literate programming" as coined by Knuth (no, Mr. Dimech, you
probably won't be interested -- for me, you can't overstate Knuth
too much) is /technically/ based on WEB, which is a text substitution
system, so can be regarded as a macro [1] system. If you look closely,
TeX [2] and METAFONT [3] are "text substitution systems" a.k.a.
macro [4] expanders.

It was the rage among some computer scientists of that time (1980s),
and Donald Knuth seems to have been interested in them back then.

So yes, in the second, strict, sense macros do play a role. By the
way, and to try to put things on-topic (hope? HAH!), noweb is also
a text expansion machinery, inspired... yes, on Knuth's WEB. Go
figure.

Cheers

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category_error
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WEB
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TeX
[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/METAFONT

 - tomás

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Quote by Knuth

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Monday, July 19, 2021 at 7:07 PM
> From: tomas@tuxteam.de
> To: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
> Subject: Re: Quote by Knuth
>
> On Mon, Jul 19, 2021 at 12:14:18AM +0200, Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor wrote:
> > Christopher Dimech wrote:
> > 
> > > Literate programming is an enhanced macro substitution
> > > package tuned to the task of rearranging source code.
> > 
> > We know what a macro is but what is literate programming
> > except it relies on macros? Does it rely to macros MORE than
> > everyday programming, including programming that uses macros,
> > or are the macros CLOSER to natural languages, maybe?
> 
> This discussion is so full of category errors that it's difficult
> to say anything relevant anymore. Let me pick two senses for
> the term "literate programming":
> 
> "Literate programming" is a pretty generic term. The most you
> can say about it is that it tries to combine "writing for humans"
> ("literature") and "writing for machines" ("programming"). Talking
> about macros in this context would be a category error [0] like
> saying "Colorless green ideas sleep furiously".
> 
> "Literate programming" as coined by Knuth (no, Mr. Dimech, you
> probably won't be interested -- for me, you can't overstate Knuth
> too much) is /technically/ based on WEB, which is a text substitution
> system, so can be regarded as a macro [1] system. If you look closely,
> TeX [2] and METAFONT [3] are "text substitution systems" a.k.a.
> macro [4] expanders.

PS: Thousands of other people have a doctorate in mathematics apart from Knuth. 

But I have read Knuth's papers and understand exactly his position on what
is literate programming.  He mas not combining "writing for humans"
("literature") and "writing for machines" (programming).  He wanted programming
to be like literature.  Thusly I am in disagreement with him.

Without Knuth others would have delved into the analysis of algorithms.  
Mostly it is about the development of tex everybody gets fired about.  
Without tex, few would have heard of him.  Still, mathematical typesetting
already existed before Knuth.  In actual fact, he got all his ideas from
the typesetting that already existed.  In "Mathematical Typography," Bulletin
of the American Mathematical Society, March 1979, Vol. 1, No. 2, 337-72; he stated
that his typesetting ideas originated from the Transactions of the American Mathematical
Society, which began publication in 1900; and some other journal (a dutch one if I remember). 

And, let us not deny it, with a lot of help from Guy Steele.
 
I remember him getting annoyed that the delta was ugly, and couldn't stand to write
papers using that symbol.  Now, he can't stand to read papers that still use it the
old delta. 

> It was the rage among some computer scientists of that time (1980s),
> and Donald Knuth seems to have been interested in them back then.
> 
> So yes, in the second, strict, sense macros do play a role. By the
> way, and to try to put things on-topic (hope? HAH!), noweb is also
> a text expansion machinery, inspired... yes, on Knuth's WEB. Go
> figure.

TeX has got people to focus on pretty printing, which is what typesetting is mainly
about.  But structural and semantic info are receiving greater and greater awareness
as opposed to formatting or displaying aspects.  LaTeX mended some of the problems with
TeX by turning a pretty printing system into a structured documentation system.

Today, I criticise how texinfo continues using Tex for its formatting engine, rather than
getting rewritten over either a LaTex engine or an improvement of it.

> Cheers
> 
> [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category_error
> [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WEB
> [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TeX
> [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/METAFONT
> 
>  - tomás
>

Quote by Knuth

[lisa-asket]

From: Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor <help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org>
To: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
Subject: Re: Quote by Knuth
Date: 19/07/2021 00:14:18 Europe/Paris

Christopher Dimech wrote:

>> Literate programming is an enhanced macro substitution
>> package tuned to the task of rearranging source code.

>We know what a macro is but what is literate programming
>except it relies on macros? Does it rely to macros MORE than
>everyday programming, including programming that uses macros,
>or are the macros CLOSER to natural languages, maybe?



Not about the reliance of macros.  But essentially it is about rearranging

programs in a way that is more logical to human beings.  At the expense 

of making it harder for those who want to change it.



>If it has a name (literate programming) there should be
>a snappy definition, otherwise I'll stick to illiterate
>programming, thank you...



That was my point, stick to illiterate programming.



>> but in fact is quite different from other ways of
>> structuring software systems.

>Uhm, okay, what ways are those?



Ways to condense complicated programs, particularly those using parallel

or concurrent techniques.  The focus should be more on the analysis of algorithms

rather than literate programming.  Literate programming evolved from Knuth's

experience with tex, ideas based on pretty display.


>> Literacy in programming means different things in different
>> circumstances. Many jobs are about getting a job done,
>> rather than showing literacy, except in academia, mostly
> written by young inexperienced idiots on low pay or no pay
>>> at all.

>What are you talking about?



Nobody was ever interested in literate programming when on commission to do

mathematical work.  People simply wanted an implementation for a specific task,

or to challenge competitors. With a special focus on keeping the word under the 

secrets act.



>> A mathematician in industry can do as much literate
>> programming as one wants but is not considered valuable
>> work. When a company takes over another, they mostly trash
>> the other system and use their own way. That's what happened
>> to me a number of times.

It was a criticism about literate programming in industry.  Many workplaces are

simply not interested in that.  But they are interested in making things to go faster,

or for algorithms to be improved.  From your previous discussions we seem to agree.


-- 
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Quote by Knuth

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Monday, July 19, 2021 at 11:25 AM
> From: "Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor" <help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org>
> To: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
> Subject: Re: Quote by Knuth
>
> Christopher Dimech wrote:
>
> > But Knuth idea goes more than that because he was obsessed
> > with presentation and wanted science to be like a work of
> > literature. Without understanding that most work is not work
> > of literature.
>
> But that's very normal and, broadly speaking, expected for
> a man with the turns that his career took. What would you
> expect, the creator of TeX saying, "hey, why do you guys care
> so much what the documents _look_ like?" ???
>
> Well, _he_ for one cared about that and he developed a good
> tool for that!
>
> "Literate programming" was his way of theorizing about TeX and
> the family of tools and methods he developed, pushed for, and
> cared for. I understand that now, it wasn't hyped as
> a superior model for programming in general. Then it makes
> much more sense.

He and some others tried published some papers on literate programming,
but the results were not as great as they had thought things would be.
Things got complicated when working on real programming tasks.  It is
mostly others around him who hyped literate programming as a super model.
It should also be said that he did not do so much programming and mathematics
himself.  As often in today's academia, it was his students and assistants
who worked the most on his ideas.

If you can make something more literate, one should go ahead; but pragmatism
and good design must be the focus.

> --
> underground experts united
> https://dataswamp.org/~incal
>
>
>

Quote by Knuth

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Monday, July 19, 2021 at 11:25 AM
> From: "Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor" <help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org>
> To: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
> Subject: Re: Quote by Knuth
>
> Christopher Dimech wrote:
>
> > But Knuth idea goes more than that because he was obsessed
> > with presentation and wanted science to be like a work of
> > literature. Without understanding that most work is not work
> > of literature.
>
> But that's very normal and, broadly speaking, expected for
> a man with the turns that his career took. What would you
> expect, the creator of TeX saying, "hey, why do you guys care
> so much what the documents _look_ like?" ???
>
> Well, _he_ for one cared about that and he developed a good
> tool for that!
>
> "Literate programming" was his way of theorizing about TeX and
> the family of tools and methods he developed, pushed for, and
> cared for. I understand that now, it wasn't hyped as
> a superior model for programming in general. Then it makes
> much more sense.

Have read his work on literate programming (though not his theorising).  With
actual programming, he delved into showing that it is possible to implement with
pascal, which he used to program Tex.  Which is something very different than
saying that literate programming should be the goal of any language.
He did that in 1984, long after the development of the first high-level languages.
Many have been doing very well with fortran, C, and lisp.


> --
> underground experts united
> https://dataswamp.org/~incal
>
>
>

Quote by Knuth

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Monday, July 19, 2021 at 10:58 AM
> From: "Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor" <help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org>
> To: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
> Subject: Re: Quote by Knuth
>
> Jean Louis wrote:
>
> > For majority of Emacs packages that is really not necessary
> > as there are documentation strings or docstrings.
>
> For it to be literate programming you would stop programming
> in the conventional sense, instead you would write in what is
> much closer to a natural language, all that you'd write would
> look like for example English but is actually _macro code_
> which describes the problem to be solved, then that is
> compiled into _actual_ source code that, in turn, solves
> the problem.
>
> So in the Emacs world, literate programming would not be
> docstrings but macros...

I wish texinfo was better at macros.

> --
> underground experts united
> https://dataswamp.org/~incal
>
>
>

Quote by Knuth

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Monday, July 19, 2021 at 10:54 AM
> From: "Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor" <help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org>
> To: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
> Subject: Re: Quote by Knuth
>
> Christopher Dimech wrote:
>
> > I understand that. About twenty years ago, I tried it.
> > It gets things even more complicated than they are.
>
> Yes, of course, as macros involve yet another layer
> in-between. You don't write source to do stuff, you write
> source to write source to do stuff.
>
> > I rather have a number of small well contained
> > implementations. I disagree with Knuth that a practitioner
> > of literate programming becomes an essayist, whose main
> > concern is with exposition and excellence of style, rather
> > than how to perform the actual computation.
>
> Aha, so that's the idea/vision! Well, how poetic! But very
> impractical in all the easy cases, and even more so in the
> difficult ones.
>
> > The biggest problem has always been how to do something,
> > rather than how to describe it.
>
> Well, these are two different tendencies, and where they all
> lead, only Jehovah knows. For example the thought with C++,
> C with classes, solve the problem by creating a model (an OO
> model) of it. An interesting thought that lead to a small
> revolution of the ... computer game industry? And today, the
> C++ enthusiasts are often not enthusiastic about OO. "It was
> big in the 90s, but ..."

It is not wise to put anything on a pedestal, as happened with OO.
Everything has a breaking point.  Not saying others should believe
me, but I know it's true.

> > I gave up trying to put everything in one file.
>
> Say what, of course you can't do that :)
>
> > And if done by students the problems will became even worse.
>
> OK, so what group do you belong to? Please tell so we can
> generalize negatively about them.

Have a look here.  It is mostly a complete disaster, but nobody listens
so as not to loose face.  Have started having doubts about the usefulness
of today's technological advancement long ago.

http://www.isesd.hi.is/ESD_Local/frameset.htm

Educated people should stop having a naive faith on the "progress" brought by
science and technology.  I do not see that we are genetically adapted and evolved
well enough to  control all the power we already have.

https://www.theguardian.com/news/2021/jul/19/edward-snowden-calls-spyware-trade-ban-pegasus-revelations

> > I know a few professors myself claiming to work on the
> > dynamic properties of everything and the bullshit they say
> > they have developed. They say they develop the theories,
> > they develop the computational algorithms needed, they do
> > everything. Until you do some work with them and realise
> > there's not much to their work. Welcome to the world of
> > academia in the western world.
> >
> > Consider Ramanujan and Perelman for instance. Both have
> > worked from some pit hole making great soup.
> > Modern societies have started treating everything as in some
> > state of illness. The second largest industry on the planet
> > is pharmaceuticals, which makes too much lousy soup.
> >
> > You just have to look at how the development of the
> > coronavirus vaccines are happening ! Everyday, you have to
> > add something else to them, else they won't work. If you're
> > constantly creating nasty chemistry, how can life within you
> > understand that you're seeking well-being?
>
> Hm ... maybe the group is people with justice
> obsession syndrome? If so, yeah, they stink.

I have here a professor of physics, going on and on about quantum internet
and the capability for ultra-secure communication.  He also projects himself
as some kind of expert on blockchain, cryptography, and artificial intelligence.
When one gets the idea of being a big man thinking of transforming a minute nation
known for its intrinsic patterns of corruption into a Centre of Excellence in the
field of digital economy, then something is really fucked up.

> --
> underground experts united
> https://dataswamp.org/~incal
>
>
>

Quote by Knuth

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Monday, July 19, 2021 at 10:25 AM
> From: "Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor" <help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org>
> To: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
> Subject: Re: Quote by Knuth
>
> Christopher Dimech wrote:
>
> > LaTeX is not about actual computation, but the production of
> > a document.
>
> LaTeX has algorithms so it is computing.
>
> Don't know what "actual computation" is tho? Actually?

Computation in the sense of what Galileo meant.  Determining location
of cosmic bodies, determining functions based on indirect measurements,
computing probabilities of some phenomenon.  That is what I mean by
computation.

> --
> underground experts united
> https://dataswamp.org/~incal
>
>
>

Quote by Knuth

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Monday, July 19, 2021 at 10:23 AM
> From: "Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor" <help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org>
> To: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
> Subject: Re: Quote by Knuth
>
> Christopher Dimech wrote:
>
> > Is that right? Who is doing extensive work with org-mode and
> > on which topic?
>
> What are you talking about, what is "extensive work"?

Extensive work on computing something with org-mode.
As far as I know, org-mode is used to organise ideas
or results, rather than doing the actual work.  Someone
referred me to a paper by Eric Fraga using org-mode. But
the real work was done in Julia.

> People use org-mode, if they use anything Emacs, that's it!
>
> --
> underground experts united
> https://dataswamp.org/~incal
>
>
>

Quote by Knuth

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Monday, July 19, 2021 at 10:20 AM
> From: "Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor" <help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org>
> To: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
> Subject: Re: Quote by Knuth
>
> Christopher Dimech wrote:
>
> > Have not seen extensive work being done in org mode.
>
> Oh, no, people use it, LaTeX is too difficult/slow and one
> tend to end up polishing the details forever in
> a (re)compilation loop that's endless, almost, is what they
> think, at least.

May we all be spared from over-thinking then :)))

> Do I agree? Yes, but at the same time that complexity and
> control over the details are the strengths of it.
>
> If one do one document in LaTeX, then polish it like crazy
> forever until the result is perfect, then one can use these
> same settings again for the next document and ever document
> ever on, just type the contents and compile and ship...
>
> So one can have the best of both worlds!
>
> Well, in theory at least ;)

Sausage with Ice-cream.

> --
> underground experts united
> https://dataswamp.org/~incal
>
>
>

Re: Quote by Knuth

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

tomas wrote:

>>> Literate programming is an enhanced macro substitution
>>> package tuned to the task of rearranging source code.
>> 
>> We know what a macro is but what is literate programming
>> except it relies on macros? Does it rely on macros MORE
>> than everyday programming, including programming that uses
>> macros, or are the macros CLOSER to natural
>> languages, maybe?
>
> This discussion is so full of category errors that it's
> difficult to say anything relevant anymore. Let me pick two
> senses for the term "literate programming":

Isn't it better you tell us when that happens (with cite) than
first say you can't say anything because of them and then 4
paragraphs of "not saying anything"...

> "Literate programming" is a pretty generic term. The most
> you can say about it is that it tries to combine "writing
> for humans" ("literature") and "writing for machines"
> ("programming")

It is a poetic idea, but in practice how could one ever
do that?

Because then the machine must be taught to understand human
language which it cannot almost by definition, except perhaps
for very simple to-the-point applications like selling tickets
to the cinema or whatever, and what's more, wouldn't that even
be (in the case of programming) even completely _undesirable_
because in programming we _want_ everything to be defined,
unambiguous, deterministic, stripped of emotion and stress,
and so on?

If you work as a carpenter or construction worker, you have
tools - like the hammer, saw, drilldriver, etc - but there is
another tool as well - and that's the human language.
For a law practitioner, maybe the language is the only tool,
even? So the language is a tool alright, it isn't about
feeling lonely, making silly "trip humor" jokes or puns
or anything like that...

But just because the human language is a tool, and maybe the
best tool we have, except for the hand or brain I guess, just
because it is a tool doesn't mean it is close to the tool that
is a programming language - isn't it the opposite,
if anything?

How would one even approach that? To combine them? Tell me,
what's the first step Knuth took merge them, if that's
what happened, actually?

Maybe Knuth lived in an era when they believed Asimovean
"robot law" AI was just around the corner?

> Talking about macros in this context would be a category
> error [0] like saying "Colorless green ideas sleep
> furiously".

?

> "Literate programming" as coined by Knuth (no, Mr. Dimech, you
> probably won't be interested -- for me, you can't overstate Knuth
> too much) is /technically/ based on WEB, which is a text substitution
> system, so can be regarded as a macro [1] system. If you look closely,
> TeX [2] and METAFONT [3] are "text substitution systems" a.k.a.
> macro [4] expanders.

"Literate programming" is based on WEB, a text substitution
system or macro system. TeX and METAFONT are text substitution
systems or macro expanders.

... hahah :)

> It was the rage among some computer scientists of that time
> (1980s), and Donald Knuth seems to have been interested in
> them back then.

rage ??? anger? What do you mean?

> So yes, in the second, strict, sense macros do play a role.
> By the way, and to try to put things on-topic (hope? HAH!),
> noweb is also a text expansion machinery, inspired... yes,
> on Knuth's WEB. Go figure.

I knew it! The text expansion machinery noweb is inspired
by WEB! Hahaha :)

-- 
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Re: Quote by Knuth

[Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor]

Christopher Dimech wrote:

> Thousands of other people have a doctorate in mathematics
> apart from Knuth

Hahaha :)

> But I have read Knuth's papers and understand exactly his
> position on what is literate programming. He mas not
> combining "writing for humans" ("literature") and "writing
> for machines" (programming). He wanted programming to be
> like literature. Thusly I am in disagreement with him.

But isn't that the same thing, isn't literature "writing for
humans"? Well, it isn't programming anyway, try compiling
"Collected Short Stories" by Ivan Tolstoyevksy and see what
happens ... yeah, DNC ... but I've heard some HUMANS read it
and thought it was good! (Maybe some of them just pretended to
have read all 14 volumes.)

> Without Knuth others would have delved into the analysis of
> algorithms. Mostly it is about the development of tex
> everybody gets fired about. Without tex, few would have
> heard of him. Still, mathematical typesetting already
> existed before Knuth. In actual fact, he got all his ideas
> from the typesetting that already existed. In "Mathematical
> Typography," Bulletin of the American Mathematical Society,
> March 1979, Vol. 1, No. 2, 337-72; he stated that his
> typesetting ideas originated from the Transactions of the
> American Mathematical Society, which began publication in
> 1900; and some other journal (a dutch one if I remember).

Yeah, but regardless of whatever, science and all human
progress works like that ... and that's a good thing.

> And, let us not deny it, with a lot of help from Guy Steele.

It is a GOOD thing he got help from other talented people!

> TeX has got people to focus on pretty printing, which is
> what typesetting is mainly about. But structural and
> semantic info are receiving greater and greater awareness as
> opposed to formatting or displaying aspects. LaTeX mended
> some of the problems with TeX by turning a pretty printing
> system into a structured documentation system.

Again,

1. That's the purpose of the tool (and not _just_ "pretty" as
   you say, also useful, indispensable stuff like math
   notation, formulaes, diagrams, indexes, footnotes,
   hyperlinks, captions, tables ...) When ideas are
   compilicated this help A LOT to convey them, also PRODUCING
   such material help the people who are active with it in
   their creative/thought process.

2. Not all people should be the same, that would be horrible
   and a totally defuct world/race! Some people care about
   this stuff and that's good for them, YOU should be active
   in the fields that YOU care about, Stop waste time on
   negativism and get into the game yourself.

PS. Some pretty good looking LaTeX if I may :)
      https://dataswamp.org/~incal/borta/borta.pdf - LITERATURE!
      https://dataswamp.org/~incal/hs-linux/docs/report/report.pdf
    - also FOR HUMANS but contains SOURCE - oh, my! what does
    that mean? I'm not a girl but is it GOOD or BAD? it is so
    hard to know! and if it stinks and didn't get a single
    citation which would BTW put in in the top echelon of the
    military-scholarly-publicistic complex - all acording to
    our man on the field covering the university world,
    Mr. Dimech - how do you check that BTW, the number of
    citations? - anyway if it stink is it beacuse I spent too
    much time on LaTeX [2] and forgor about the actual task?

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Querulant
[2] https://dataswamp.org/~incal/hs-linux/docs/report/report.tex

-- 
underground experts united
https://dataswamp.org/~incal

Re: Quote by Knuth

[Gregory Heytings]

>> "Literate programming" is a pretty generic term. The most you can say 
>> about it is that it tries to combine "writing for humans" 
>> ("literature") and "writing for machines" ("programming")
>
> It is a poetic idea, but in practice how could one ever do that?
>

$ wget http://tug.ctan.org/systems/knuth/dist/tex/tex.web
$ weave tex.web
$ ./tex tex.tex
$ xdvi tex.dvi

$ tangle tex.web
$ <Pascal compiler*> tex.p
$ ./tex

* AFAIK currently no Pascal compiler can compile the original, unmodified 
TeX Pascal code

Quote by Knuth

[Christopher Dimech]

> Sent: Wednesday, July 21, 2021 at 4:52 PM
> From: "Emanuel Berg via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor" <help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org>
> To: help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
> Subject: Re: Quote by Knuth
>
> Christopher Dimech wrote:
>
> > Thousands of other people have a doctorate in mathematics
> > apart from Knuth
>
> Hahaha :)
>
> > But I have read Knuth's papers and understand exactly his
> > position on what is literate programming. He mas not
> > combining "writing for humans" ("literature") and "writing
> > for machines" (programming). He wanted programming to be
> > like literature. Thusly I am in disagreement with him.
>
> But isn't that the same thing, isn't literature "writing for
> humans"? Well, it isn't programming anyway, try compiling
> "Collected Short Stories" by Ivan Tolstoyevksy and see what
> happens ... yeah, DNC ... but I've heard some HUMANS read it
> and thought it was good! (Maybe some of them just pretended to
> have read all 14 volumes.)

I exclude writings that are primarily informative-technical, scholarly,
journalistic - from the rank of literature.

> > Without Knuth others would have delved into the analysis of
> > algorithms. Mostly it is about the development of tex
> > everybody gets fired about. Without tex, few would have
> > heard of him. Still, mathematical typesetting already
> > existed before Knuth. In actual fact, he got all his ideas
> > from the typesetting that already existed. In "Mathematical
> > Typography," Bulletin of the American Mathematical Society,
> > March 1979, Vol. 1, No. 2, 337-72; he stated that his
> > typesetting ideas originated from the Transactions of the
> > American Mathematical Society, which began publication in
> > 1900; and some other journal (a dutch one if I remember).
>
> Yeah, but regardless of whatever, science and all human
> progress works like that ... and that's a good thing.

Yes.  But that was a criticism when someone said that one can never
overestimate knuth.

> > And, let us not deny it, with a lot of help from Guy Steele.
>
> It is a GOOD thing he got help from other talented people!
>
> > TeX has got people to focus on pretty printing, which is
> > what typesetting is mainly about. But structural and
> > semantic info are receiving greater and greater awareness as
> > opposed to formatting or displaying aspects. LaTeX mended
> > some of the problems with TeX by turning a pretty printing
> > system into a structured documentation system.
>
> Again,
>
> 1. That's the purpose of the tool (and not _just_ "pretty" as
>    you say, also useful, indispensable stuff like math
>    notation, formulaes, diagrams, indexes, footnotes,
>    hyperlinks, captions, tables ...) When ideas are
>    compilicated this help A LOT to convey them, also PRODUCING
>    such material help the people who are active with it in
>    their creative/thought process.
>
> 2. Not all people should be the same, that would be horrible
>    and a totally defuct world/race! Some people care about
>    this stuff and that's good for them, YOU should be active
>    in the fields that YOU care about, Stop waste time on
>    negativism and get into the game yourself.

It is like what is happening with coronavirus.  Don't be negative
and worry about coronavirus, governments have told us.  Now the idiotic
minister is in hospital after contracting coronavirus even though he is
fully vaccinated.

https://timesofmalta.com/articles/view/minister-michael-farrugia-hospitalised.888037

> PS. Some pretty good looking LaTeX if I may :)
>       https://dataswamp.org/~incal/borta/borta.pdf - LITERATURE!
>       https://dataswamp.org/~incal/hs-linux/docs/report/report.pdf

Got no problem with that.  In my field, recording concepts in mathematics,
requires its own writing system in the form of mathematical notation.

And many people don't like it because it is distinct from natural languages
in that it aims to communicate certain ideas with more precision and less
ambiguity.

>     - also FOR HUMANS but contains SOURCE - oh, my! what does
>     that mean? I'm not a girl but is it GOOD or BAD? it is so
>     hard to know! and if it stinks and didn't get a single
>     citation which would BTW put in in the top echelon of the
>     military-scholarly-publicistic complex - all acording to
>     our man on the field covering the university world,
>     Mr. Dimech - how do you check that BTW, the number of
>     citations? - anyway if it stink is it beacuse I spent too
>     much time on LaTeX [2] and forgor about the actual task?

If you are in an unfamiliar territory, you need a guru.

To check the citations, you take a journal (or a number of them),
and take the references.  Next you compile a counting system
of how many times a paper is included in the reference list.  You
can apply different criteria for categorisation.  You can find a number
of studies like this

Several library databases and other resources can be used to find how many
times a particular article has been cited and to also find a list of the
documents that have cited the article.


> [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Querulant
> [2] https://dataswamp.org/~incal/hs-linux/docs/report/report.tex
>
> --
> underground experts united
> https://dataswamp.org/~incal
>
>
>