URL embedding is something I must leave to others. I'd be starting from cold as regards Moinmoin. Maybe we should simply fall back on html? Remind me why we need anything fancier.
Voice-over I have strong feelings against. Distracting, ineffective and culturally dependent. Traditional and reassuring maybe, but only in your own mother tongue, accent and mannerisms. Nothing going for it. And I say that as an ex-lecturer (and courseware developer). Use soothing music. It's only wallpaper. And then only in a YouTube showcase, not in a serious expository text. The same goes for moving text, or "titles" as I think movie makers call them. Only good for identifying the footage, like a clapper-board. The effort to read it can distract the viewer from the object you want him/her to attend to. There will always be accompanying text. I think the purpose of animation in technical exposition is to convey spatial concepts non-verbally. Therefore verbiage is nothing but a distraction. I like your use of coloured dots. It conveys succintly that the content of a given cell doesn't matter: just the interplay between cells. If you use numbers, or even letters, the viewer wastes brain-cycles processing these before grasping they are of no importance. If you need more modal dimensions: shape and size. As regards shape, chicks and tadpoles may be slightly better than squares and circles, but one must balance being boring against being distracting. I'd err on the "boring" side to start with, and spice-up judiciously. People assume animations have got to be Loony Toons. But someone prepared to consider programming in any language, let alone J, needs an attention-span longer than a 5 year old TV watcher. The viewer may have to study the animation for quite some time to absorb its principle. Eye candy soon gets irritating. See the "grasshopper escapement" animation, halfway down in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Harrison -and work out how it manages to be friction-free. Jiminy Cricket would soon begin to grate. Further to that example, I think continuous animation loops are good. (Though it's nice to be able to stop 'em!) Take a J primitive which is relatively simple but maybe hard for a beginner to intuit, like monadic "=" (self-classify). Not something with bells and whistles like ";:". Personally I'd like to see an animation of self-classify, because coming from APL I'm still not altogether comfy with it in my own mind. And remember the better it conveys its message, the more trivial and "obvious" it looks and the less time the viewer spends looking at it. It's why writers of public notices are always too pompous and prolix: they don't want to appear dumb. It's really quite unrewarding work, in a way. Ian On Tue, Feb 2, 2010 at 5:56 AM, bob therriault <bobtherria...@mac.com> wrote: > Thanks for the review, Ian > > It definitely needs to be sped up and, although music could be added, it was > going to be finished with a voice over and sound effects. I hadn't got around > to final version, but when I read Oleg's comment about animation, I exported > the 'work in progress' to YouTube. YouTube does provide a string for > embedding, but I didn't think it would work within an email. > > I would be happy to work on animations as they were needed for specific > primitives. My experience says that there is a certain level of fundamental > understanding that is required before animations are really effective, before > that they tend towards eye-candy (or worse misleading). If you have a > primitive in mind let me know and we can go through some iterations to see > how productive we are. > > Cheers, bob > > ps. you can put videos into J labs as well, by using the jbrowser file and > calling specific URL's hiding it within the PREPARE section. > eg. > PREPARE > launch_jbrowser_ > 'http://www.apple.com/ca/ipodtouch/what-is/pocket-computer.html' > PREPARE > It has been a while since I have done this and the result is that a whole > browser window will open, but when refined this may have some possibilities. > I'm not as sure how this will work with the new browser interface. bt > > On -Feb1-2010, at -Feb1-20106:43 PM, Ian Clark wrote: > >> I like it, Bob. >> >> The minimalism may arise from it being a first effort, but it shows >> it's neither necessary nor wise to over-egg the pudding. >> >> Minor crits: could do with being sped up. Needs music. YouTube has a >> library of free soundtracks: you can just attach one for now. >> >> YouTube movies can be easily embedded in your own html file. Stefano & >> I have done it. They generate you an <object> to copy/paste. See >> source of http://www.maxclark.me.uk/undeadtree/interspex.htm for an >> example. >> >> But how to do it with MoinMoin? >> >> So... are you offering to do a 15 second movie for each J primitive? >> >> Ian >> >> >> On Mon, Feb 1, 2010 at 10:08 PM, bob therriault <bobtherria...@mac.com> >> wrote: >>> Hi Oleg and Ian, >>> >>> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ODxv498p4ME >>> >>> This isn't about a specific function, but is an animation i put together to >>> explain why it is useful to organize information into arrays. I developed >>> it on keynote, but haven't yet put a soundtrack to it. It's not really high >>> end, but it wasn't too hard to put together either. Let me know if you have >>> more specific ideas for animations. >>> >>> Cheers, bob >>> >>> On -Feb1-2010, at -Feb1-201012:50 PM, Oleg Kobchenko wrote: >>> >>>>> From: Ian Clark <earthspo...@googlemail.com> >>>> >>>>> >>>>>> One winning instructional strategy, including Gilman and Rose, >>>>>> is telling a story for each piece of material. Such stories, >>>>>> among other things, may revolve around exo-paradigms. >>>>> >>>>> When I used to program in FORTH (sign of a mis-spent youth) one >>>>> well-beloved primer in the FORTH community was illustrated with >>>>> engaging but instructive cartoons. Thus the standard word SWOP was a >>>>> little two-headed dragon that did what you'd guess with objects on the >>>>> stack. Can anyone remember the book and remind me of its title? >>>> >>>> Starting FORTH, by Leo Brodie >>>> >>>> http://www.forth.com/starting-forth/sf2/sf2.html >>>> >>>> >>>> This is fun stuff all right. And a good read for a vacation. >>>> >>>> >>>> What I was thinking for APL/J for a long time was >>>> an interactive or animated illustrator of the operations, >>>> especially those that manipulate multidimensional and >>>> nested structures. >>>> >>>> >>>>> I know someone (http://www.leelamaria.com/) who could do us a wodge of >>>>> cartoons like that. Shall I try to get them interested? >>>> >>>> >>>> >>>> ---------------------------------------------------------------------- >>>> 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 > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > For information about J forums see http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For information about J forums see http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm
