Hi, I really hope you won't find my feedback egocentric, I simply state my opinion this way because I believe others might have the same view as me.
- Linearity: absolutely. That is what I need the first time. And I mean Factor handbook / The language only - language concepts, basic combinators, etc, but from this territory everything! After that, the hypertext is just perfect, but I have to get to it somehow without losing my momentum. They say that until you have a goal you can achieve it because you have motivation. Without knowing the features of a language though I cannot set a reasonable goal. (Learning the language itself is no goal, doing something with it is one.) So I have to go through the docs without motivation and if they are unfriendly I will simply leave them be :) I have to mention that I really like the short straightforward nature of the descriptions though! Very good work. But linearity would be key, too. - General setup and accessibility: with that I did not have any problem, jEdit supports Factor out of the box so I had no difficulty with syntax highlighting either. That must be home territory for the language though for trivial reasons... The "one app bundled with everything for every platform" philosophy is also very appealing to me! I would need such a doc, too. - Tutorials: the palindrome was all right, but it is maybe not enough. Though far not as important as a readable doc! My learning style just needs some fundamentals then I can go and experiment myself. Another important remark: you really have to consider what is on the other side: Clojure is on the other side! If you want to stay alive in the long run, Factor has to be accessible! It is appealing already and people know it. And they begin with the Factor UI and they like it, then they want to develop professional applications with it and they have difficulties. On the other had they watch the overwhelmingly awesome presentations of Rich Hickey and fetch a short book on Clojure and have the almost instant opportunity to start professional development on an equally appealing platform. Not an easy situation - but it can be if you do the right moves. I guess I have to be promiscuous after all since both languages provide me continuous orgasms and stimulation with their depth and sanity. Bye, Balazs On Nov 12, 2010, at 8:01 AM, Shaping wrote: > Chris, I like your document, even though it is out of date. > > I think Balazs wants (as would I and others, I suspect) a nearly linear > tutorial-like instruction, including: setting up the Git repository; > checking out the clean branch; building Factor from that branch; running > Factor; setting up your Emacs editor (pick the best editor and use it to > show off the color and formatting; Factor looks like hell in black and > white); some simple instruction on tweaking font styles and sizes in the > Listener, Browser, and your Emacs editor; Slava's palindrome tutorial; his > little GUI-with-button-that-beeps tutorial; his TCP time-server tutorial > (and more). Describe how to use the most often used features, the ones you > must know to be fluent and effective, like hitting F2 in the Listener after > saving code in your editor, to pull in and compile all changed source-code > files, or using Ctrl-n and Ctrl-p for easily recalling and looping through > all of your previously entered expressions, and so on. You, the fluent > ones, can add some much more good stuff to this basic path of instruction, > which should be a narrow tree with a clear path toward fluency with the > environ and minimal competency with the language, with a few branches off to > side-topics, with appropriate links into the Browser help system, for > deeper, optional study. You don't want to overload the new guy with the > massive hypertree of Factor knowledge. It's too much, but will be become > very approachable once a practical foundation is laid with a few basic > programming exercises and practical advice on how to use the tools (Git, > Listener, Browser, Emacs). > > > Shaping > > -----Original Message----- > From: Chris Double [mailto:chris.dou...@double.co.nz] > Sent: 2010-November-11, 05:24 > To: factor-talk@lists.sourceforge.net > Subject: Re: [Factor-talk] Docs and other topics > > On Fri, Nov 12, 2010 at 12:09 AM, Balazs Toth <balazs...@gmail.com> wrote: >> - is there some accumulated, readable documentation of Factor somewhere? > Or at least a cheat sheet about the various features of the language? The > help system is really nice and sufficient as it is if someone already knows > what he is looking for. > > The built-in help, http://docs.factorcode.org and various blogs posts > are what is available. > >> - in another thread you are talking about the UI and the adaptation of the > system by someones supervisor. I would like to adapt the language as a > supervisor, but cannot do that because of its unreal learning curve and lack > of a handbook. > > The learning curve is not really 'unreal'. I learnt it back when it > had no documentation at all! That aside a printable readable document > would be nice. No one has stepped up to write one yet. There used to > be a 'Factor Handbook' PDF and maybe something like that would still > be useful. Here's the last version I generated from the latex source: > > http://www.bluishcoder.co.nz/handbook.pdf > > (Note that it's way out of date. I just present it to show the type of > thing that might be useful). > >> About how reliable are the various features one can read about in the > help? > > I'm not sure what you mean by this. > > Chris. > -- > http://www.bluishcoder.co.nz > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- > -- > Centralized Desktop Delivery: Dell and VMware Reference Architecture > Simplifying enterprise desktop deployment and management using > Dell EqualLogic storage and VMware View: A highly scalable, end-to-end > client virtualization framework. Read more! > http://p.sf.net/sfu/dell-eql-dev2dev > _______________________________________________ > Factor-talk mailing list > Factor-talk@lists.sourceforge.net > https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/factor-talk > > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ > Centralized Desktop Delivery: Dell and VMware Reference Architecture > Simplifying enterprise desktop deployment and management using > Dell EqualLogic storage and VMware View: A highly scalable, end-to-end > client virtualization framework. Read more! > http://p.sf.net/sfu/dell-eql-dev2dev > _______________________________________________ > Factor-talk mailing list > Factor-talk@lists.sourceforge.net > https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/factor-talk ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Centralized Desktop Delivery: Dell and VMware Reference Architecture Simplifying enterprise desktop deployment and management using Dell EqualLogic storage and VMware View: A highly scalable, end-to-end client virtualization framework. Read more! http://p.sf.net/sfu/dell-eql-dev2dev _______________________________________________ Factor-talk mailing list Factor-talk@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/factor-talk
