I guess we basically agree that for those "sold" on J will mostly use the the signs from the J vocabulary and do not need to hide them. What those suggesting the keywords want is the option of having a tool for education to catch the attention and interest of those who do not know J and hopefully get them interested to learn more.
Unfortunately very many people who see tacit J get the wrong impression and think it too complicated and do not continue. I am all for having more easy examples and demos in order to get people into J. Look at people who go into EXCEL and only use 0.0001% of what EXCEL can do. Pretty much anyone can do something there. Same should be possible in J but for some reason it does not look like it is. I do not know what is needed but having a mini EXCEL in J would be interesting. We have basically everything needed to do it but..... 2009/2/23 Devon McCormick <[email protected]> > I see the short-term advantage of hiding J beneath keywords but I think > it's > costly because it submerges some of the language's advantages. > > One of J's general advantages is that it is a symbolic notation. In his > essay "Seven Great Blunders of the Computing World", Neville Holmes lists > "Scientific Programming" as one of these blunders because this promoted > lexical, rather than symbolic thinking. Unfortunately, this is one of > those > blunders so well-entrenched, like order of operations, that a good > alternative will be rejected because it corrects a mistake we've grown used > to. > > J seeks a good compromise between the "weird" symbols of APL - of which I > am > very fond - and the practicality of acknowledging that we're still stuck in > the ASCII jail if we want widespread compatibility. The J symbols > represent a lot of careful thought because many of them illustrate > similarity of concept with similarity of notation. > > For instance, isn't it handy that "match" (-:) is so close to "less" (-.)? > I'll often do something like the following when I'm comparing two data > items: > > aa -: bb NB. Do they match? > 0 > aa -. bb NB. If not, what are the different elements? (If that's why > they don't match) > NB. The items of "aa" not in "bb" appear here... > > Looking across the vocabulary page highlights many other useful relations > between the characters of a symbol and the symbol's relation to another, > similar concept written with similar characters. > > I agree that perhaps an initial presentation should shield the audience > from > "raw J" but it's a disservice to continue this way for very long. > > We discussed this issue in a recent NYCJUG: > http://www.jsoftware.com/jwiki/NYCJUG/2009-01-13#Beginner.27sregatta . > > Feel free to add to the discussion by adding another page on this topic and > linking to what's there. > > Regards, > > Devon > > On Mon, Feb 23, 2009 at 12:02 PM, Gilles Kirouac <[email protected]> > wrote: > > > On using primitive names, Alex wrote: > > > > >there are dis-advantages and the most glaring one > > > is the loss of tacit programming. > > > > Really? > > > > plus times minus > > plus times minus > > (plus times minus)f. > > + * - > > 5(plus times minus)f. 4 > > 9 > > 5(plus times minus) 4 > > 9 > > > > That said, I see other disadvantages, one being that there is no > > J literature using those primitive names. They should be only > > a short-term softener for exposure. > > > > Learning the glyphs is not that difficult; always have a copy of > > the vocabulary sheet available; have three of them in your house! > > > > > > ~ Gilles > > > > ---------- Original Message ----------- > > From: Björn Helgason <[email protected]> > > To: General forum <[email protected]> > > Sent: Mon, 23 Feb 2009 07:16:22 +0000 > > Subject: Re: [Jgeneral] Teaching > > > > > Very good! > > > I guess we need more of such easy introductions. > > > > > > 2009/2/23 Alex Rufon <[email protected]> > > > > > > > Hi Guys, > > > > > > > > I would just like to suggest as looking at this in a different > > > > perspective. > > > > > > > > I have a few/limited success in teaching J using the standard symbols > > > > but I do have a better success in teaching J with the "primitives" > > > > add-on. Of course the there are dis-advantages and the most glaring > one > > > > is the loss of tacit programming. > > > > > > > > foo=: monad define > > > > NB. Look at the following while turning off your J knowledge > > > > NB. Create 2 copies of a 10 by 5 integer > > > > data=. 2 copy integers 10, 5 > > > > NB. Create a new command which would sum a table > > > > sumtable=. plus table > > > > NB. Get the primary key, first column > > > > primarykey=. 1 take rank 1 data > > > > NB. Remove the primary key > > > > data=. drop rank 1 data > > > > NB. get the total value by each key > > > > sumdata=. (nub primarykey) stitch primarykey sumtable key data > > > > ) > > > > > > > > fubar=: 3 : 0 > > > > data=. 2 #i. 10 5 > > > > primarykey=. 1 {."1 data > > > > sumdata=. (~. primarykey),. primarykey +/ /. }. "1 data > > > > ) > > > > > > > > But if you would take into consideration me teaching 10 programmers J > > > > using primitives add-on and all of them remembered a few of the > > commands > > > > in comparison to teaching 10 programmers using J notation and 8 to 9 > of > > > > the students walking away confused. So if your objective is to teach, > I > > > > would start them with general concepts and use the "primitives" addon > > > > then later on ... for advance topics, you slowly introduce the > actually > > > > J notation. It works for me. > > > > > > > > I believe somebody else here has done this too (just forgot who he > is). > > > > > > > > r/Alex > > > > > > > > > > > > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > > > > For information about J forums see > http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm > > > > > > > > > > -- > > > Björn Helgason, Verkfræðingur > > ... > > ------- End of Original Message ------- > > > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > > For information about J forums see http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm > > > > > > -- > Devon McCormick, CFA > ^me^ at acm. > org is my > preferred e-mail > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > For information about J forums see http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm > -- Björn Helgason, Verkfræðingur Fugl&Fiskur ehf, Þerneyjarsundi 23, Hraunborgum Po Box 127,801 Selfoss , t-póst: [email protected] gsm: +3546985532 Landslags og skrúðgarðagerð, gröfuþjónusta http://groups.google.com/group/J-Programming Tæknikunnátta höndlar hið flókna, sköpunargáfa er meistari einfaldleikans góður kennari getur stigið á tær án þess að glansinn fari af skónum /|_ .-----------------------------------. ,' .\ / | Með léttri lund verður | ,--' _,' | Dagurinn í dag | / / | Enn betri en gærdagurinn | ( -. | `-----------------------------------' | ) | (\_ _/) (`-. '--.) (='.'=) ♖♘♗♕♔♙ `. )----' (")_(") ☃☠ ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For information about J forums see http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm
