Consider comparing the writing of J to the writing of English.  What would be 
in your "Strunk and White" for the writing of J?

(The Elements of Style by William Strunk, Jr and E B White is a "writing" book. 
 Famously brief, it discusses rules for writing correctly and well.)

Kip

Sent from my iPad


On Feb 2, 2013, at 7:38 AM, Raul Miller <[email protected]> wrote:

> While I am comparing the learning of J to the learning of english:
> 
> Do we have grammar school students learn english by asking them to
> only use [insert grammatical structure here]?  Why or why not?
> 
> If so, how well does that work?
> 
> If not, what do we do instead?
> 
> Thanks,
> 
> -- 
> Raul
> 
> On Sat, Feb 2, 2013 at 2:13 AM, Linda Alvord <[email protected]> wrote:
>> Also, this has only forks:
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 5!:4 <'t1'
>> 
>>      ┌─ 2
>>  ┌───┼─ {.
>>  │   └─ [
>>  ├─ $
>>  │        ┌─ [:
>> ──┤   ┌────┼─ ;
>>  │   │    └─ ]
>>  │   ├─ /:
>>  └───┤    ┌─ [:
>>      │    ├─ ;
>>      └────┤    ┌─ [:
>>           │    ├─ /. ─── <
>>           └────┤
>>                │      ┌─ [:
>>                └──────┼─ i.
>>                       └─ [
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> This has both forks and hooks:
>> 
>> 
>> 
>>   5!:4 <'t2'
>> 
>>      ┌─ 2
>>  ┌───┼─ {.
>>  │   └─ [
>>  ├─ $
>> ──┤   ┌─ ]
>>  │   │     ┌─ /:
>>  │   ├─ & ─┴─ ;
>>  └───┤
>>      │     ┌─ [:
>>      │     ├─ /. ─── <
>>      └─────┤
>>            │      ┌─ [:
>>            └──────┼─ i.
>>                   └─ [
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> Linda
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: [email protected] [mailto:programming-
>> [email protected]] On Behalf Of Linda Alvord
>> Sent: Saturday, February 02, 2013 2:00 AM
>> To: [email protected]
>> Subject: Re: [Jprogramming] inverse oblique
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> I remember fondly how Ken loved to read the unabridged dictionary. Richness
>> of the language and the derivations of the words was a joyous experience
>> for him.  The J language has this same richness.
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> For students coming to the language with years of mathematical background
>> in abstract algebra, calculus, differential equations and the like, they
>> are ready t o jump easily to abstract combinations.
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> I keep thinking in terms of the long time it takes high school students to
>> master functional notation like  f(x)  and  g(x).
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> To get from  t1 to t2 requires and "idiom"  x u&v y ↔ (v x) u (v y)
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> t1=: 13 :'(2{.x)$(;y)/:;</.i.x'
>> 
>> t2=: 13 :'(2{.x)$y/:&;</.i.x'
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> So although t1 is longer than t2,  t2 is more condensed and compex.  This
>> is why I say easier:
>> 
>> 
>> 
>>    t1
>> 
>> (2 {. [) $ ([: ; ]) /: [: ; [: </. [: i. [
>> 
>>    t2
>> 
>> (2 {. [) $ ] /:&; [: </. [: i. [
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> The condensed spacing of  /:&;  gives away the increased complexity of the
>> second tacit version.
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> My guess is that you would spend less time reading the dictionary to master
>> 
>> t1 than t2.
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> Linda
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> -----Original Message----- wo
>> 
>> From:  <mailto:[email protected]> programming-
>> [email protected] [mailto:programming-
>> <mailto:[email protected]> [email protected]] On
>> Behalf Of Raul Miller
>> 
>> Sent: Friday, February 01, 2013 9:20 AM
>> 
>> To:  <mailto:[email protected]> [email protected]
>> 
>> Subject: Re: [Jprogramming] inverse oblique
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> How do you define "easier"?
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> In my opinion, it's easier to go from simple (fewer tokens) to complex
>> (more tokens), but also someone has to write the code to do the
>> transformation and until that's been done even this concept of "easier" can
>> be indistinguishable from "can't be done".
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> --
>> 
>> Raul
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> On Fri, Feb 1, 2013 at 5:05 AM, Linda Alvord <
>> <mailto:[email protected]> [email protected]>
>> 
>> wrote:
>> 
>>> If t1 is easy tacit and t2 is advanced tacit, wouldn't it be easier
>> 
>>> for  J to figure  t2  from  t1  than it is for me?
>> 
>> 
>>>    t=: 5 7 2 ?@$ 1e6
>> 
>>>    s=: $t
>> 
>>>    x=: </.t
>> 
>>>   t1=: 13 :'(2{.x)$(;y)/:;</.i.x'
>> 
>>>   t-:s f x
>> 
>>> 1
>> 
>>>   t2=: 13 :'(2{.x)$y/:&;</.i.x'
>> 
>>>   t-:s g x
>> 
>>> 1
>> 
>>>   t1
>> 
>>> (2 {. [) $ ([: ; ]) /: [: ; [: </. [: i. [
>> 
>>>   t2
>> 
>>> (2 {. [) $ ] /:&; [: </. [: i. [
>> 
>> 
>>> Or is that just wishful thinking?
>> 
>> 
>>> Linda
>> 
>> 
>> 
>>> -----Original Message-----
>> 
>>> From:  <mailto:[email protected]> programming-
>> [email protected]
>> 
>>> [ <mailto:[email protected]> mailto:programming-
>> [email protected]] On Behalf Of Roger
>> 
>>> Hui
>> 
>>> Sent: Thursday, January 31, 2013 1:49 PM
>> 
>>> To: Programming forum
>> 
>>> Subject: Re: [Jprogramming] inverse oblique
>> 
>> 
>>>   t -: (2{.s) $ x /:&; </.i.s
>> 
>>> 1
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>>> On Thu, Jan 31, 2013 at 10:47 AM, Roger Hui
>> 
>>> < <mailto:[email protected]> [email protected]>wrote:
>> 
>> 
>>>>   t=: 5 7 2 ?@$ 1e6
>> 
>>>>   s=: $t
>> 
>>>>   x=: </.t
>> 
>> 
>>>>   t -: (2{.s) $ (;x)/:;</.i.s
>> 
>>>> 1
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>>>> On Thu, Jan 31, 2013 at 10:28 AM, Raul Miller
>> 
>>> < <mailto:[email protected]> [email protected]>wrote:
>> 
>> 
>>>>> Let's start with an arbitrary array:
>> 
>> 
>>>>>   A=: i. 2 3
>> 
>> 
>>>>> We can box oblique lines from this array:
>> 
>> 
>>>>>   </. A
>> 
>>>>> +-+---+---+-+
>> 
>>>>> |0|1 3|2 4|5|
>> 
>>>>> +-+---+---+-+
>> 
>> 
>>>>> However, the interpreter does not currently provide us with an
>> 
>>>>> inverse for this operation:
>> 
>> 
>>>>>   </.inv </. A
>> 
>>>>> |domain error
>> 
>> 
>>>>> One problem is that you cannot uniquely determine the first two
>> 
>>>>> elements of the shape of the original array by inspecting </.'s
>> 
>>>>> result:
>> 
>> 
>>>>>   (</. 5 7$0) -: </.7 5$0
>> 
>>>>> 1
>> 
>> 
>>>>> If its shape is provided, how might we reconstruct the original array?
>> 
>> 
>>>>> [For the sake of simple code, it's ok to focus on numeric, rank 2
>> 
>>>>> arrays.]
>> 
>> 
>>>>> --
>> 
>>>>> Raul
>> 
>>>>> --------------------------------------------------------------------
>> 
>>>>> -
>> 
>>>>> - For information about J forums see
>> 
>>>>> <http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm>
>> http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>>> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>> 
>>> For information about J forums see  <http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm>
>> http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm
>> 
>> 
>>> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>> 
>>> For information about J forums see  <http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm>
>> http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm
>> 
>> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>> 
>> For information about J forums see  <http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm>
>> http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>> 
>> For information about J forums see  <http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm>
>> http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm
>> 
>> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>> For information about J forums see http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
> For information about J forums see http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm
----------------------------------------------------------------------
For information about J forums see http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm

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