Hello Ed and everybody, I'm grateful for your answers and assure you I'll study them. Special thanks to Johannes, for the description of the "mundane" task he handles with Leo. Thanks also to Ed and Offray for sharing their views and motivations. There has been a mention of an important fact in the few answers already: while written in Python and Python-centric, Leo is open to use with and for other programming languages. I was amazed when I realized, some weeks ago, the number of programming languages Leo is instructed to handle. Dear Ed, I'm not coming from the place of doubting and requesting. I tried to ask the questions, might not be the right questions yet, but I'm looking for them, to understand what's needed to turn Leo in a mass phenomenon. Based on the quality and power of the concepts it implements, it probably should be one. And the one thing that's lacking might be simple words describing this quality and power in ways "my grandmother could understand". Well, maybe not my late grandmother, but my "programming grandmother", the "John Doe"-programmer. OK, I'm aware Leo is not for programmers only, but I picked the one obvious potential "clientele". Maybe even stating who it's for is the first question to answer. I hope to be back soon with more irritating questions :). Regards, Nenad
2016-07-06 18:11 GMT+02:00 Offray Vladimir Luna Cárdenas <[email protected]> : > Hi, > > For me, Leo is great for its community and for the ideas it embodies. The > main one, in my case, is being able to (de)construct thinking with > computers by building *emergent programmable outline structure*. It took me > years to understand the power of this idea: Any part of a Leo document/tree > can be accessed to program the tree itself or anything in Leo. The first > time I found this idea with documents was with TeXmacs[a] at the end of > 90's, then I found mind maps, but they're not really programmable, and it > was really clear to me until I found Leo and used for several years > *mostly* for non-programming. > > Even if now I don't use python as my primary computer scripting language > and I'm more interested in Pharo, live coding, interactive documentation > and data activism & visualization, this Leo idea has been pretty > influential in the way I write (see [1], in Spanish) and in my research and > related prototypes, including Grafoscopio[2], a tool that tries to combine > and cross-pollinite ideas of IPtyhon, Leo and Smalltalk. > Tony Hoare (as quoted by Alan Kay in [3], page xvii) says that Algol 60 > "was a great improvement, especially on its successors". Now that we're > talking about Leo legacy and continuity, I think is important to underline > a set of Leo's core ideas, that can be embedded and enriched in other > computing environments and tools, besides Leo itself. Of course, as > technologist we love our tools (any good craftsman does, because they're > deeply related with how and where his making takes form), but sometimes > implementation obscures ideas, and we try to see the value of something > inside itself, when maybe the best way to find it is by "dislocation", so > seeing incarnations of core ideas within different implementations, helps > to a better understanding of them and is a way to enrich the legacy. > > Thanks for Leo, its community and its ideas, > > Offray > > Links: > > [a] http://texmacs.org/tmweb/home/welcome.en.html > [1] > http://mutabit.com/offray/static/blog/output/posts/la-forma-en-que-escribo-para-el-doctorado.html > [2] http://mutabit.com/grafoscopio/index.en.html > [3] > https://duckduckgo.com/?q=squeak+learning+programming+with+robots&t=ffsb&ia=products > > > On 05/07/16 12:46, Propadovic Nenad wrote: > > Hello Ed and everybody, > I'm writing inspired by Eds post "Wanted: students for the Leo Code > Academy" of today, but I'm carrying this question with me since, well, > February, when I started using Leo, again, after a pause of maybe ten years. > And yes, I recognize that Leo helps me organize my thoughts and code and > texts once in a while, but there seems to be a big gap between those who > dig it and those who don't, and I seem to be on the don't-dig-side. Not the > fact that it can be useful, but the fact that ut can be useful to extents > that it has some fanatic fans. > I tried using Leo for tasks that jumped at me, like, translating some code > from Perl to Python. I did it by analyzing the (very poor) structure of > that code in Leo, and it still took me a week; afterwards I realized I > would have been better of, if I had just translated it to Python - command > by command - , *without* understanding the structure, and *then* tried to > force structure upon it; so decomposing and analyzing seems not be the > right method for this kind of task. > Now, again, another task: I'm analyzing some Python code, much better > structured. Still, it's quite complex, the state-machine it contains has > multiple rather unclear transitions and conditions of changing > transitions... Leo helped me only so much, but just the implications of > this and that changing value in the code at runtime... is just not yet > clear to me. Trying to analyze seems to be less useful than adding log > entries to see the runtime values. > So, after seriously trying to use Leo for tasks that came along my way, > and finding it nice, but not so useful that I'd say it's indespensable, may > I ask: what are you guys using Leo for? > I realize that writing code of the size and quality of Leo itself is a > huge task, and would be hard without a good tool; but are there smaller, > but also very useful things you can do with Leo, which would be much harder > without it? > (Yes, I have read the documentation; not I have not *studied* it). > I'd appreciate examples which *show* me why Leo is great. I really want to > love it, honestly. I *tried* to find it extremely useful ten years ago, > when I stumbled upon it after reading about the greatness of outlines > (articles from Steve Litt). Yet by now I have the impression that it's most > useful in a greenfield environment, when you have control of structure, > anyway. Being a contractor, hopping from project to project, I almost never > do such development. > Thoughts? Answers? I'd really appreciate them. > Regards, > Nenad > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "leo-editor" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to [email protected]. > To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. > Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/leo-editor. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. > > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "leo-editor" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to [email protected]. > To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. > Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/leo-editor. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "leo-editor" group. 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