I am always more comfortable when communicating face-to-face, next by audio, and last by text; the reason is that a lot of surrounding information is being progressively lost. For the record, I do not think, at all, that you explanation is condescending, and when I wrote, >Dan explanation is very detailed. You can find a brief one in the Dictionary >Appendix F >Trains: I did not mean “very detailed” in a pejorative sense (I could say ’I admit the email does not read well’ but I do not want to sound as some questionable CRU character) I was just trying to answer the following last question , > From: rsdonovan at hotmail.com > To: programming at jsoftware.com > Hi Jose Mario! > > Can you/anyone please explain the name=: 'body' (1 :) syntax? > I have never seen this before. Where is it documented? Perhaps, I could have written a more meaningful message if I had not been in a rush to catch my train last evening. If anything, the dictionary’s explanation might be too brief (I also wrote), >the quoted paragraph is located in Dictionary/Dictionary/II. Grammar/F. >Trains. I >vaguely remember reading somewhere in the dictionary something similar to the >following: > >x (vn c) <-> vn c x , x (c vn) <-> x c vn and x (a0 a1) <-> (x a0) a1 I turns out that an earlier version of the dictionary (J Version 5, 1992) said the following in that location (and probably was subsequently dropped when most of the tacit support for forming adverbs and conjunctions tacitly was decommissioned), “ b) An adverb is produced according to the following definitions (using nv to denote noun or verb): x (a1 a2) is x a1 a2 x (c nv) is x c nv x (nv c) is nv c x “ The above clear explanation apparently is not in the dictionary anymore (or is it somewhere else?) and this might be the reason why some newcomers are puzzled by those constructions. Incidentally, the same version of the dictionary said, “ c) A conjunction is produced […] x (c a) y is (x c y) a “ If that particular form had not been decommissioned then not only tacit conjunctional programming would be possible but also it would also be as rich as tacit adverbial programming is.
From: Dan Bron <[email protected]> To: Programming forum <[email protected]> Sent: Sat, December 5, 2009 9:39:10 AM Subject: Re: [Jprogramming] newbie question Pepe wrote: > Dan explanation is very detailed. Is it strange that I prefer J for its brevity, while being a verbose man? I often post detailed messages "for the sake of the community". It's almost like writing up a FAQ entry. I do it in the hope of helping lurking newbies and archives searchers. I just wanted say that so no one thinks I'm talking down to them, especially veteran Jers who might take such a level of detail as condescension. -Dan [Jprogramming] newbie question Jose Mario Quintana josemarioquintana at 2bestsystems.com Sat Dec 5 11:33:17 HKT 2009 I did not refer properly to the place in the dictionary (perhaps I should learn Dan's way); the quoted paragraph is located in Dictionary/Dictionary/II. Grammar/F. Trains. I vaguely remember reading somewhere in the dictionary something similar to the following: x (vn c) <-> vn c x , x (c vn) <-> x c vn and x (a0 a1) <-> (x a0) a1 but my memory could be wrong. [Jprogramming] newbie question Jose Mario Quintana josemarioquintana at 2bestsystems.com Sat Dec 5 07:03:44 HKT 2009 Dan explanation is very detailed. You can find a brief one in the Dictionary Appendix F Trains: " A two-element train of a conjunction with a noun or a verb produces an adverb. For example,&.> produces an adverb that might be called “each”, and the adverbbc=:<" might be called “box cells” because, for example,0 bc x would box the atoms ofx . " That bident and the next one in that appendix (adv adv) are essential for tacit adverbial programming (see the tacit filter definition). ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For information about J forums see http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm
